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STATELY LOTUS IN TEMPLE COURT 



BY 

NIPPON'S LOTUS 
PONDS 

Pen Pictures of Real Japan 



BY 

MATTHIAS KLEIN 

Formerly Missionary and Government Teacher in Japan 



Illustrated 




New York Chicago Toronto 

Fleming H. Revell Company 

London and Edinburgh 



,.**^ 



^^« 



Copyright, 1914, by 
FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY 



APR -3 1914 



New York: 158 Fifth Avenue 
Chicago: 125 N. Wabash Ave. 
Toronto: 25 Richmond St., W. 
London: 21 Paternoster Square 
Edinburgh: ido; Princes Street 



/.^ 



'CI,A371i80 



FOREWORD 

"^OJOUKNEES in Japan, with regard to 
^^ their feelings toward the country and its 
^^ people, must pass through three stages," 
said a keenly observing Westerner, long resident 
in Japan, to me. " In the first stage, the new ar- 
rival, prepared to find the country almost supernal, 
views everything through rose-coloured glasses. 
Next comes— and it is liable to come quickly— the 
period of disillusionment, when the pendulum swings 
to the other extreme, often leading to a complete 
revulsion of feeling and causing an utter inability 
to recognize qualities of which Japan may rightly 
be proud. The third stage is the happy medium, 
where with clarified vision both sides are conceded; 
and where grey and sombre colours, as well as those 
of brighter hues, are laid on in their proper pro- 
portion." 

The writings of globe-trotters and tourists almost 
invariably reflect the first stage, and the many ex- 
travagant and often laughable statements found in 
them may only be excused because of the writers' 
brevity of time. They must necessarily pen their 
impressions on the spur of the moment, and every 
one knows how very often first impressions are 

incorrect. 

7 



8 FOREWORD 

Then we have seen some productions which 
seemed tinged with overmuch sarcasm and lacking 
in kindly charity; but assuredly only those who 
have safely arrived at the third stage — among whom 
we humbly hope to be numbered — are competent 
to judge impartially. However, because of a well- 
meant endeavour to pass over unpleasant features, 
some writers who have resided for longer periods 
in the country naturally ignore the more gloomy 
aspects. 

Aside from historical works, most of the many 
descriptive books on Japan and its people which 
the writer has examined have largely, if not entirely, 
been confined to the cities and the regular beaten 
tracks. Whatever the Japanese themselves have to 
say on this subject, strongly indicates that they pre- 
fer to dwell on city life, considering it more to their 
credit. Art albums and gaily-coloured postcards 
nowadays depict very little of the real rural life 
of interior Japan. " Do not simply praise our 
magnificent scenery," they say. " We want to hear 
about our progress in modern improvements, science, 
etc." 

True, the careful observer recognizes what gi- 
gantic strides the government has made, but if 
really acquainted with the heart of Nippon — the 
rural population — which represents three-fourths of 
the Mikado's subjects, he cannot but feel that this 
country has yet a stupendous task before her ; which 
sentiment is strongly voiced by statesmen, financiers 



FOREWORD 9 

and educators, as well as missionaries and religious 
leaders. 

The following sketches are the result of a careful 
collection of facts and incidents which have been 
jotted down during a sojourn in the interior, com- 
prising the entire time of our residence in Japan. 

Though making no pretensions to completeness, 
we have ventured to speak out our whole mind on 
almost every point, except where, for the sake of 
propriety, certain things were better left untold. 
We have not tried to tell what we have beheld or 
enjoyed for the mere sake of sightseeing; with the 
exception of a few educational trips, our subject- 
matter has been collected in a real concrete form 
while prosecuting the work of a Christian mis- 
sionary. 

We have travelled on the frailest barks to re- 
motest island nooks and villages ; had many a hair- 
breadth escape from shipwrecks and breakneck 
tumbles over steep precipices; rode on wheel or 
walked over long stretches of lonely mountain roads 
in the darkest of nights ; slept in uncanny old Bud- 
dhist temples and eaten " broths of abominable 
things " in farmers' cottages ; and have thus come 
into unusually close contact with priest and peasant. 

Along with the Bible, tracts and comet, another 
faithful companion has been the camera, and some 
of its productions we are happy to present to the 
reader, illustrating the narrative more fully. 

M. K. 



CONTENTS 



I. "0-MATSUEI" 19 

Little Japanese at their best — Sweet- scented 
temple groves — Pitiful wail of a devotee — Dis- 
ease-transmitting " healer " — Vain prayers — 
Tapping bells and rolling drums — Frenzy of 
hard-faced priests — A massive temple — Mag- 
nificent carvings — Sweeping up the coppers — 
Lotus worshippers — Significant metaphors — In- 
voking the gods — Burly wrestlers — Streets 
lined with fiery paper lanterns — A charming 
fairyland — The Christian Mission — The mel- 
low-toned temple bells. 

II. THE VILLAGE BAEBER ... 26 

Whetting his razor with a file — Unsightly 
blotches — Currycombs on human skulls — The 
barber's patterns — Shaving foreheads, noses 
and ears — Persecution for parting hair — Loud- 
scented oils — Greasy aprons — A squalling 
baby's skull shaved — A dash for liberty. 

IIL WHEEE CUPID'S WINGS ARE 

CLIPPED 35 

Noxious weeds in matrimonial field — Marriage 
licenses unknown — Easy divorces — Lovers 
pledging in blood — The match-maker — The 
merchant's marriageable daughter — Cumber- 
some wooing — The pair obtaining the first 
glimpse — Why not consulted — Compelled to 
wed — The bridal procession — Clam soup as a 
11 



12 CONTENTS 

symbol — Blacking the teeth — Outlandish cus- 
toms — Kidnapping the bride — Spying the 
young lassie in the paddy-field. 

IV. HAPPY NEW YEAE ... 44 

Peasants cling to the old New Year — Worship- 
ping the holiday god — Fishermen grooming their 
" water horses " — Obeying the rules ; the dining 
car chef wiping his perspiring face with a dish- 
towel — A storm of reprimands — How the po- 
liceman obeyed the bathing regulation — Peas- 
ants pounding mochi for New Year — ^A tough 
and tasteless substance — Stealing to pay debts 

— The Japanese calendar and signs of the 
Zodiac — Immaculate native costumes and ill- 
fitting foreign suits — Exquisite holiday decora- 
tions — A New Year drinking bout considered 
necessary — Blessing us with oranges and raw 
eggs — Serenading the gods. 

V. CUEIOUS STKEET SCENES . . 54 

Quaint Oriental streets — Little booths — Work- 
men squatting at their tasks — A strange smithy 

— Numberless geta thundering over wooden 
bridges — Eating lotus and burdock roots — 
Bamboo children ! — Hot sweet potatoes and 
chilly fingers — A rural fire brigade — " March- 
ing through Georgia" as a funeral dirge — Pri- 
meval bathing customs — Hypnotized inspectors 

— An insane woman — Praying to the rising sun. 

YL PILGRIMS AND PILGRIMxiGES . 65 

Hordes of pilgrims — A spectacular outfit — 
Handling filthy coppers defiled by lepers — Sup- 
plicating the wrong deity — A pilgrim priest's 
nightly howl — Expelling the demons — Twenty- 



CONTENTS 13 

three thousand miles of devotion — Teachers and 
pupils on idolatrous journeys — Sunrise on 
Fuji-yama. 

VIL MUSICAL ECCENTRICITIES . 72 

" Tom-cat on the tiles " — Popular music vulgar 

— Geisha singers — Ventriloquists — Fishermen 
lyrics — Helter-skelter solo by evangelist — How 
the preacher composed music (?) as he sang — 
Strange instruments — Youths promising better 
things — A delightful musicale — Worshipping 
the Emperor's Rescript. 

VIII. FISHES AND FISHERMEN . 79 

The shout over a school of sardines — Men, 
women and children muster on the beach — Red- 
letter day in fishertown — Phantom ship rigged 
out with fiery lanterns — Landing a junk ; ex- 
citing scene that beats an Irish wake — His 
unique holiday garb — • The daily farewell a sol- 
emn lite — His primitive anthem — ■ An aquatic 
exhibition beating " Peter's vision " — Little 
brown women divers — Monstrous whales landed 

— Buried on his own hunting grounds amid 
howling storms. 

IX. 'MID FLOWERS AND FORESTS . 90 

Japan, the flower land — The other side — The 
marvellous gift of display — Festivals of the 
glorious cherry, the wistaria, the rhododendron, 
iris, lotus and chrysanthemum — Crimson ca- 
mellia on snow-laden boughs — Landscaping pe- 
culiar to the race — Grotesque dwarfs — The 
disappointing pomegranate — Other fruits — The 
science of bouquet-making — Costly vases, mar- 
vels of art. 



14 CONTENTS 

X. WAKING UP THE GODS . . .101 

A shrewd ex-Buddhist priest — Crowds waking 
up the patron god before daylight — Degradation 
of priestcraft — Playing a losing game — One 
monk damning the other to the lowest hell — 
Farmers and the horse god — Disappointed peas- 
ants beating the weather god ; dragged over dusty 
roads — No rain ; long unused water-wheels 
stacked before the shrine — More idols in Japan 
than China — Optimism of the Christian worker. 

XL "KENJUTSU" 112 

Fighters dyed in the wool — Unwilling con- 
scripts — The sword's great role — Medieval war 
weapons ; swords excelling the Toledo blade — 
Where ten thousands of ears and noses lie buried 

— That Indian instinct ; treachery — Invoking 
the aid of the gods to slay his foe — The latter 
overhears his daring prayer — How an old cham- 
pion carried off the laurels with his iron fan — 
Fencing among students and police — Grim con- 
testants fighting like sturdy oxen — Ju-jutsu — 
Raw-boned fishermen competing with the police 

— Pupils laid out unconscious — An impromptu 
temperance lecture. 

XII. BY LAND AND SEA . . .124: 

Undef aced marks of ancient Japan — Baby ears 
blown into the river — Tourist running a race 
with the train — A nondescript lot of travellers 

— Women and children sadly ignored — Human 
" vacuum sweepers " — Astonishing disregard for 
the proprieties — An officer and his haltered 
criminals — " Man-pull-cars " ; Pullman cars — 
The Japanese harvesting great benefits from for- 
eign soil — Where paper umbrellas, match boxes 
and salt are made — Disorder in railway cars — 



CONTENTS 15 

Empty mail sacks too good for seats — Girl stu- 
dents as " night riders " — Neither privacy nor 
handkerchiefs deemed a great necessity. 

XIIL A PAEADISE OF ISLES . . 138 

Where the frightened natives saw Perry's black 
ship — Sleeping like a rabbit — Testing the pilot's 
skill — Islets like molehills on meadow — Phan- 
tom beings — Miniature Alps — Monkeys climb- 
ing the gmiwale — Insular powder magazines — 
Horses and cows taking a boat ride — Napoleon's 
hat. 

XIV. ENCHANTING MIYAJIMA . . 144 

One of the grandest sights in the Land of the 
Rising Sun — Multitudes of pilgrims and pleas- 
ure seekers travel to this Edenie spot — Here the 
feet of Emperors and mighty warriors have trod 
the path to the sacred shrines — Births and 
deaths forbidden — No howling dogs or rattling 
'rikishas — A mysterious sensation; visiting 
Shinto temples in the gloom of dawn — That 
unique and famous torii; the charm of artists — 
The sacred horse — Tottering pagodas — Be- 
witching shops and booths — The superb gran- 
deur of aesthetic landscaping. 

XV. BURSTING THE INCUBATOR . 153 

The village schoolmaster — Finishing school in 
three days — An army of underpaid teachers — 
Five dollars a month salary — Straw-covered 
temples become school buildings — Astonishing 
crowds of black heads — A medley of youthful 
voices, preparing lessons in unison — Ingenious 
" turkey-track " painters — A picture of Christ 
at the head of the world's sages — Poorly 



16 CONTENTS 

lighted, overcrowded class rooms — Puzzling ideo- 
graphs — Sons of the soil bursting old traditions 

— Japanese school lads' ambitious heights — 
Boys " rocking " the foreigner's windows — Mon- 
keys wearing pants — Mirth-provoking English. 

XVI. rUl!^EEAL PAGEANTS . . .167 

Spectacular parades — Strange cofl&ns — The for- 
eigner's dreadful mistake — Repulsive cremato- 
ries — Indecorous mourners — Funerals at night 

— A Christian funeral in a Buddhist cemetery 
— ■ Gospel hymns amid crumbling idols. 

XYIL HONOUEING THE SPIKITS . 175 

A mysterious awaking — A ghostly procession — 
White lanterns and sacred morsels — The spirit's 
farewell at the ocean's brink — The "All-saints- 
day " — Lighting the spirits back to their earthly 
home — The moss-covered shrine of the patron god 

— A knight in ancient garb lighting the stone 
lamps in the murky tvv^ilight — Quenching the 
ancestors' thirst — Weird-sounding prayers 'mid 
tapping bells — A Christian preacher in a Bud- 
dhist forum. 

XVIII. THE FAEMEE AND HIS DO- 
MAIN 181 

Japanese tillers of the soil — Though livelihood 
meagre, are contented — Cruel tax burdens — 
Fearful punishment for delinquents — Vegetari- 
ans from necessity — Cultivating every square 
inch — Threshing with the flail — The one- 
handled plough — Men and women knee-deep in 
muddy fields — The millstone of Bible times — 
The friendly farmer's curious wardrobe — How 
the street urchins greet the " red-haired, green- 
eyed" foreigner. 



CONTENTS 17 

XIX. THE GKEY HOUSE AXD ITS 

MAKER 191 

Dingy exteriors — From street all houses look 
like barns — The agile little carpenter — Feet 
competing with hands — Coolies turning drudg- 
ery into pleasure — Hired priest ceremoniously 
dispels demons from building site — These grey 
tile a marvellous product — Crooked beams, the 
Oriental's notion — Holding boards with the toes 

— Native tools — " Drinking " tobacco and tell- 
ing stories. 

XX. THE JAPAIS^ESE " YADOYA " . 198 

" Honourably condescend to come in " — Red lan- 
terns and fox gods — Divesting one's self of foot- 
gear — The native house, a puzzle-box; though 
as simple as its stolid- looking denizens — The 
country kitchen, a haunted abode — Boiling 
baths — An outlandish menu — The walking res- 
taurant — Unsanitary beds — The screech of the 
geisha — Weary nights — One grand redeeming 
feature. 

XXI. OVER THE TEACUP . . .210 

"Poison to your spirit" — Quaint Mr. Kimura 

— That two-inch finger-nail — Sipping tea 'neath 
trellised wistaria — Tedious and preposterous 
modes of salutation — The blind massageur ; dig- 
ging his elbows into the patient's ribs — The time- 
honoured tea ceremony — The Japanese official's 
martyrdom to politeness — At the tea planta- 
tions — The shrub imjxjrted from China — Pic- 
turesque and merry tea pickers — Curing the 
leaves — Why prefix " Mr." to " Barbarian " ? — 
"Banzai!" 

INDEX .223 



ILLUSTRATIONS 

Stately Lotus in Temple Court . Frontispiece ^ 

FACING 
PAGB 

Modes of Ladies' Hair Dressing. The Wed- 
ding Ceremony 32 «^ 

Old-time Musicians Serenading Wedding 

Party 40*^ 

Firemen's Antics on New Year's Day . . . 48'^ 
Pilgrim Priests with Image of Buddha . . 66 «^ 
Performing on GekJcin and Samisen .... 72 ^' 

Drawing in the Net 80 > 

Fashioning Costly Vases 98 . 

Appealing to Temple Gods. A Lesson in Ju- 

Jitsu 112 

The Sturdy Vegetable Pedlar. Children Mak- 
ing Match Boxes 132 

The World-famous Torii — Facing the Shrine . 144 ' 
'Rikisha Pullers — Drawing Lots for Passengers. 

Funeral Flower Carts 168 ^ 

The Priest in Ghostly Converse 176 - 

Clumsy Rice Huller — in Constant Use . . . 184 -^^ 
Interior of Japanese House. The Agile Little 

Carpenter 196 '' 

Picturesque Tea Pickers 218 ' 

18 



" 0-MATSUEI " 

WHE:N"CE this throng? Where are they 
going? Gaily-dressed grown people and 
happy children in flowered kimonos and 
fluttering ribbons, are clattering on geta toward 
yonder massive temple canopied and encircled by 
stately pines and cedars and evergreen groves of 
sweet-scented magnolia and camellia, festooned with 
purple wistaria and luxuriant ivy vines. To-day is 
0-matsuri — the grand festival of the Nichiren — 
signifying " Lotus of the sun." This is the name 
of the founder of a prominent Buddhist sect, and 
was derived from a dream of the sun on a lotus 
flower, which the mother of this priest claimed to 
have had ere his birth. 

We follow this festive throng through a high- 
roofed temple gate with clumsy, rustic doors, on 
each side of which stand the formidable-looking, gi- 
gantic Nio, guardian gods; our path leading along 
an exquisitely trimmed evergreen hedge, and under 

19 



20 « 0-MATSURI " 

long-limbed cherry trees, whose large double-pink 
blossoms we admired a few months before. 

From a thicket to the right comes the pitiful 
wailing cry of a devotee, who, on the stone pave- 
ment surrounding a popular shrine, is making some 
fifty or one hundred circuits as prescribed by the 
priest for the recovery of his sick child. To the left 
a woman with a baby strapped on her back, tarries 
in front of a life-sized wooden god; first she rubs 
the idoFs face, whose features have almost been 
worn away by her predecessors, then touches her 
own eyes and face and shoulders, and administers 
the same treatment to her child. 

On smooth-shaven boards fastened to another 
near-by shrine are written in the Japanese script 
about forty or fifty repetitions of the word me 
— meaning eyes, and again a similar number of 
the word chichi (milk). The former is a request 
for the healing of the eyes ; the latter some mother^s 
prayer for a supply of nature's nourishment for 
her pining infant. 

But the centre of attraction seems to be one of 
the large temples, whence comes " the roll of the 
drums." Here hard-faced priests, in spectral robes 
and bare feet, with tones and gestures hideous to 
a stranger are busily engaged in their holiday per* 



WIZARD-LIKE PRIESTS 21 

fonnance. Were one a believer in ghosts, such 
sights would certainly make his flesh creep. Now 
and then these priests enliven things a little more 
by the wizard-like sound of two sticks beating to- 
gether or by tapping a bell. 

At each of two beer-barrel-shaped drums near 
the entrance, an acolyte can be seen incessantly 
beating for an hour or so and keeping splendid time 
to the chanting of the sacred formula, '^ Namiir 
miyoho-renge-hyo," which all the devotees use as 
an invocation and which can be seen inscribed on 
many tombstones, meaning, " Oh the scripture of 
the lotus of the wonderful law." When it seemed 
that the drummers were about to cease they re- 
newedly called their vim into action and beat with 
a little faster tempo, and with energy and per- 
severance which reminds one of the exertions of 
the priests of Baal. 

These priests, the ingredients of whose religion 
largely consist of grovelling, fortune-telling super- 
stitions and " good-luck " charms, are by tradition 
and sentiment the natural enemy of the Christian 
missionary. They are not men of violence, and sel- 
dom come into open conflict with him, though ever 
his sworn opposers. Viewing the fanatical zeal of 
priest and people at festivals now, suggests the 



22 « 0-MATSURI " 

query, " To wliat iheights of frenzy must their de- 
votion have led them five hundred years ago ? " Or 
when they dedicated their once magnificent temples 
and pagodas, most of which to-day are very old 
and present such a gloomy and neglected appearance. 

A massive temple this is, having cost a princely 
sum; hut like all other temples in Japan, it is 
constructed entirely of wood, and its exterior tar- 
nished by the hand of time. Curiously ornamented 
grey tiles cover its roof; over the main porch and 
underneath the long, low eaves and architraves are 
excellent carvings of fabulous dragons, flowers, 
spirited storks, birds flitting over the waves of the 
sea and tortoises swimming through it; in the 
centre of the nave hangs a magnificent, gilt balda- 
chin, adorned with glittering pendants — the entire 
producing an extremely imposing effect. 

The teeming thousands of rustic worshippers 
press up the broad stairway of the temple and cast 
their votive offerings, usually of the lowest denom- 
ination, into a large receptacle, which many, miss- 
ing, scatter over the floor and keep an acolyte busy 
sweeping them up. The throng then in turn jerk 
a long, clumsy rope, rattling an unmusical gong, 
and with bowed head and palms held closely to- 
gether, they reverently worship. 



THE LOTUS— A METAPHOR 2S 

In the meantime a large concourse moves on over 
artistically curved stone bridges and gathers round 
the beautiful lotus ponds, where out of the slimy, 
stagnant water, from between the stately, classical 
leaves, the glorious, waxen-petalled, white and pink 
lilies greet their aesthetic admirers. But these have 
long been preceded by the ^^ elite " of all these 
zealots — those who in the hush of the morning twi- 
light came trudging out to these lotus pools to see 
the buds open and " hear the eerie, exquisite music 
of the petals unfolding." It is the symbol of the 
new birth of the soul, they say; that crystal pure 
flower rising up out of the mire, metaphors the 
soul's transfiguration, which though growing in sin 
shall soon bloom in Paradise. 

At gala days of this sort old and new Japan meet 
in conglomeration. In booths are cinematograph 
shows and graphophone concerts, and close by in 
front of a shrine are worshippers clapping their 
hands, striving to wake up the gods. A few steps 
away, the performers on the old-fashioned Japanese 
banjo, the samiserij though with but a monotonous 
" tom-tom,'' like spellbinders hold the crowd. On 
top of a high scaffolding, composed of thick bamboo 
poles, sits a man pounding an unmusical drum, 
invoking the favour of the gods in behalf of the 



24 " 0-MATSURI " 

burlj, almost nude wrestlers performing in a com- 
pound below. In other little booths cheap candies, 
toys and gaudy little novelties are sold to the eager, 
pleasure-loving crowds that throng into town from 
village, valley and mountain side. 

The temple grounds, as well as the narrow streets, 
are decorated by these dexterous-fingered Japanese 
with many-coloured festoons and flags, evergreen 
arches and artificial trees. But equally gay is the 
scene at night, when great, glowing red paper lan- 
terns, like fiery racemes, strung thickly on either 
side of the streets, remind one of some fairyland. 
There is one house, however, in the centre of this 
turmoil, which by such decorations does not mani- 
fest its sympathy with this idol festival. It is a 
Christian chapel with its front thrown wide open, 
where several native evangelists with the mission- 
ary preach alternately for hours to the passing multi- 
tudes. 

To-day the priests have plied a rattling trade. 
It is late at night and we long for rest ; but a horde 
of zealous devotees in the temple yard, with a 
monstrous, queer-shaped drum, incessantly torment 
our ears with that discordant, nerve-racking din. 
Wondrous the contrast between this ear-splitting 
noise and the soft, mellow-toned temple bell. Be 



MUSICAL TEMPLE BELLS 25 

it at dawn of day or in the evening twilight, or 
when the town folk and peasants are toiling, from 
yonder woody hillock, across clustering huts and vil- 
lages and on over mud-dyked, terraced rice fields, 
roll the rich, sweet notes of ancient Oriental bells, 
rung by swinging a large horizontally suspended 
pole against the side. But, after all, this sweetness, 
as it comes and dies away with a few echoes, when 
we know that it only means a helpless mortal bowed 
before gods of stone, causes a shudder, and we seem 
to hear the tolling of some funeral dirge. 



n 

THE VILLAGE BARBER 

APROPOS of a strenuous day of rattling a big 
^ pair of horse-clippers over many bristling 
heads, mowing down a few stray plants off 
the men's faces, drooping eyelids, ears and nostrils ; 
the nape of women's necks and eyebrows, etc., we 
caught our neighbour barber whetting his razor for 
the fray. He went about it in this fashion: in 
front of his low-eaved shop, up against a cedar post, 
he stuck his little, handleless sort of a razor, and 
holding it in position with his body, applied to it 
the magic grit of a big file, till beautiful sparks 
imitating shooting stars induced us to quickly draw 
near and see and as quickly leave again. How 
fortunate for his customers that he has no heavy 
beards to practise on ! 

Barbers in the rural districts being equally pro- 
ficient (?) in modes of Western hairdressing, we 
have for convenience sake selected this neighbour, 
but in order to avoid a gaping crowd and for sani- 
tary reasons we call him to the house instead of 



PRIMITIVE TOOLS 27 

invading his shop. On his maiden trip, as well as 
all consecutive calls, he came with an old chest 
drawer, containing his entire outfit. When condi- 
tioning that the tools used must first be thoroughly 
cleansed, he triumphantly responded that '^ accord- 
ing to the law " the barber disinfects his tools once 
a week ! Even this rule, we fear, is more honoured 
in the breach than the observance. However, he 
always submits them to a strong carbolic solution 
in our presence, though we had to strongly remon- 
strate against his using a long-haired duster which, 
in his shop, he has whipped over the skull of every 
" Tom, Dick and Harry." The barbers' razors, 
shears and clippers are simply transmitters of all 
sorts of disease germs. Children's heads are often 
covered with blotches of eczema or some scrofulous 
eruption, and those hairless scars can be seen on 
the heads of students and grown men almost 
anywhere. There is seldom an attempt made 
to relieve the poor children of this malady, 
as it is popularly supposed to have a beneficial 
effect. 

Among his variety of tools, of which it is neces- 
sary to use but one or two at our home, this neigh- 
bour has one primitive article which we always 
decline without a trial. It is a sort of circular 



28 THE VILLAGE BARBER 

currycomb which the manufacturer obtains with the 
least effort from thick bamboo poles, sawing cup-like 
sections from the joints and cutting coarse teeth in 
the rim. Just the thing to scratch a hog's back 
with, though intended for a more " elevated " 
use. Passing by some barber shop we have often 
been amazed at the contented expression of the 
fellow in the chair, while the tonsorial artist plied 
this instrument over his close-cropped head; when 
a com cob would be a feather brush in com- 
parison. 

Upon receiving his fee and about ready to depart, 
this handy neighbour respectfully sucks in his 
breath, bows his '' Bayonara,' and as solemn-faced 
as a deacon walks away. But no sooner is his back 
turned than his countenance changes; for, peeping 
around a comer, we see him indulging in a broad 
smile, and he is evidently revelling in amusement 
over the foreigner's cranky sanitary notions. 

But though our polite friend is not up to date in 
practice, he ought to be in theory. Eor seven years 
there has hung in his shop, for decoration rather 
than example, a large print of about twenty heads, 
representing different modes of hairdressing. In 
one row are the Russian, Italian, American, Eng- 
lish and French brands; the remainder are all 



MONGOLIAN PHYSIOGNOMY 29 

Japanese, denominated as follows, " Teacher, 
Scholar, l^obility. General, Actor, Young man. 
Gentleman, Engineer, Company, Merchant, Police- 
man, Gallant, Strong man, Painter, Lawyer.'' A 
marvellous and ample assortment; though largely 
the product of the artist's imagination. 

Now and then a grandsire, a relic of olden times, 
can be seen with the front of his head shaven and 
the back hair gathered in a quaint little pipe-stem 
queue drawn forward over the shaven patch. Some- 
times careless fellows wear their coarse hair two or 
three inches long in a simple, refractory and undi- 
vided mop, but almost all of the common classes, 
whose skulls may have never seen a fine-tooth comb 
or brush, have their hair closely cropped. What 
remains sticks up like bits of black wire and causes 
no wonder that the barber must manipulate his 
heavy clippers with both hands. This close crop- 
ping reveals more fully the Mongolian type of 
features, and as a rule the abnormally developed 
skulls of even the smallest boys, whose physiognomy 
strongly bespeaks an extra amount of conceit as 
well as a highly combative disposition. 

After a hair-cut, the face, forehead, nose and 
ears are shaven tiU smooth and shiny. The coun- 
tenance, taking on a more ruddy colour, may be 



30 THE VILLAGE BARBER 

made a little more attractive by a touch of powder. 
Dudes and belles, geisha in particular, are in great 
dread of sunburns, and resort to powder for face 
and hands. This reminds us of the tooth powder; 
rarely can one see an even set of teeth — unques- 
tionably due to the diet — rice, vegetables and deli- 
cacies as well, all soft and mushy. However, since 
the innovation of modern dentistry, coolie and 
rikisha-man, even, have their toothbrushes and a 
plentiful supply of cheap powder. Uncomely 
though their faces be, they reveal not a little amount 
of personal vanity. 

Among the more up to date a hair-cut with 
scissors is in demand, and pompadours being natural 
and easily fashioned, are therefore the most popular. 
A few, however, who with the assistance of hair- 
oil have succeeded in cultivating a part, are now 
and then designated as high hara, meaning " high 
collar." Though this term may sometimes be used 
in derision of some dude, who with an aristocratic 
air stalks through a company of yokels on the village 
byways, it is more generally applied to all such 
who seek, though often so vaguely, to imitate West- 
em modes of life. 

At a gathering of some young men whom we 
knew, one of them being present with hair parted 



FERTILE BREEZES SI 

was provokingly ridiculed by the leader ; but to our 
amazement this latter gentleman came to our house 
a few days later, his newly parted hair literally 
dripping with grease and sickening with perfume. 
The cabin boy of the steamer had such a copious 
supply of a strong wintergreen-scented pomade lav- 
ished on his obstinate hair, which glittered like a 
raven's wing, that even his passing shadow, out- 
side the cabin door, caused my meagre spirits to 
involuntarily shrink and to repel such fertile 
breezes. 

Once while in a bicycle shop we caught sight of 
a fellow appearing in the doorway who had just 
hailed from the barber. Smallpox had pimpled his 
face into a sort of pebbled leather, but we were 
more amazed at his glistening hair. Like the dia- 
mond dewdrops of the grass blades in the morning, 
so every spear of his wiry hair was adorned with 
jewels of oil, which flashing sunbeams transformed 
into a veritable halo. Then with self-complacency 
and in a characteristic Japanese manner he brushed 
his stout hand back over his head, and as when 
rubbing one's finger over a dampened toothbrush — 
only magnified — sprays of dewy vapour filled the 
air. How bewildered some of these young scions 
look when told that good taste in the West does not 



m THE VILLAGE BARBER 

countenance such loud-scented oils ! What must be 
thought of the women's coiffure, dressed semi-weekly 
and freshly oiled, though seldom washed — ^not more 
than once a month ? Then pity the numberless and 
often sore-eyed little tots whose faces are constantly 
brushed by the greasy and unkempt hair of those 
on whose backs they are carried. 

While a goodly number of the more refined ladies, 
teachers of Girls' Schools, etc., by precept and prac- 
tice discourage the use of this sort of hairdressing, 
it is very evident that most of the gentler sex, in 
retaining their ancient coiffure, now as always, also 
consider a lavish supply of oil a necessary adjunct. 
Only a comparatively diminutive number can en- 
hance their beauty with pomades — rose, lavender, 
wintergreen and similarly scented oils. The com»- 
mon Japanese woman resorts to a very cheap, home- 
made product, and woe betide the olfactory organs 
should one happen to pass through a crowded third- 
class compartment on steamboat or train. The mas- 
culine half of this class, however, are hard-shell 
" Japanesey " enough to ever deny themselves of 
this luxury. Evidences of oil seem to be every- 
where — too often are they found on kimond collars, 
also on the erstwhile white aprons of barbers and 
barberesses, which, whether their wearers remain 







MODES OF LADIES HAIR DRESSING 




THE WEDDING CEREMONY 



BABY'S SKULL SHAVED 33 

in the shop, or move from house to house in quest 
of customers, present an unsightly black shine. 
Hitherto it has been the custom to shave the in- 
fant's head on the eighth day. Among the boys this 
is periodically continued until they are ten or 
twelve; for this reason they are quaintly called 
'' Bon-san," after the Buddhist priests, who always 
have their heads shaven. With the girls this seem- 
ingly cruel practice is partially discontinued after 
the third year ; thereafter, according to the parents' 
taste, locality and station, the hair is dressed in 
different modes. 

Quite often these tonsorial operations are per- 
formed by the father or mother. Through the open 
paper sho]ij with its many finger-poked holes in- 
viting repair, we saw a persevering dame with a 
handleless and not over-sharp excuse of a razor, 
in spasmodic strokes shaving the skull of a dark- 
brown-faced dear girlie of but a single summer. 
The process must have felt anything but pleasing, 
and the brave child would not have so readily re- 
vealed the Spartan fire of her race had not the two 
strong hands of her older sister, like a relentless 
vise, held this black-locked head in their inflexible 
grasp. However, this work is not accomplished in 
a minute, and sometimes youngsters with only one 



34 THE VILLAGE BARBER 

hemisphere denuded, in loose kimono romping about 
the narrow streets, suggests that either a successful 
dash for liberty and escape from torture has been 
made, or else that more pressing duties or a blunt 
razor have forced an adjournment. 



Ill 

WHERE CUPID'S WINGS ARE CLIPPED 

THOUGH the numerical strength of Chris- 
tianity in Japan is comparatively small, its 
influence on the national customs is most 
strikingly revealed; not only so in the moral and 
intellectual uplifting of woman and the caring for 
the feeble, etc., but also in revolutionizing a goodly 
number of most unsightly aspects of Japanese life, 
such as plural marriage. Still the matrimonial field 
has not yet by any means been freed from all the 
noxious and destructive weeds, some of which have 
from centuries past wrought havoc with the happi- 
ness of homes. 

Here marriage licenses are unknown; the only 
legal requirements being the consent of the parents, 
and that a post-nuptial report be given the authori- 
ties. This consent is necessary to a legal marriage 
until the age of twenty-five and thirty in the woman 
and man respectively. Still in numerous cases such 
sanction would have been very immaterial but for 
the matrimonial aspirant's concern regarding lega- 
3$ 



36 WHERE CUPID'S WINGS ARE CLIPPED 

cies, for instance. Thus, though a dual life may- 
have heen lived for some time, as a rule the parents' 
consent will be solicited sooner or later, that the 
marriage contract might become legally ratified by 
the authorities. Where no license is required, 
divorces are also obtained without difficulty — on 
the part of the husband at least — and are granted 
for any reason. 

" But what sort of matrimonial contract is gen- 
erally in force among the common people ? " we 
asked a well-informed Japanese. " There are not a 
few instances where a mutual promise only is con- 
sidered necessary," he replied ; " or the signing of a 
little agreement by the contracting parties putting 
the impress of their right thumb, dipped in India 
ink, upon the paper. In Japan, where in business 
contracts the individual stamp is of equal validity 
to a written agreement in the West, in nuptial af- 
fairs, the scratch of the nail even (not on the face — 
on paper) is sufficient. At times some attractive 
geisha, or others of easy virtue, may elect to be the 
mistress of some man; and in sealing the contract, 
such may cut off a finger tip, or with a penknife 
draw a few drops of blood into a cup of sahe which 
is then mutually drunk." 

As to the elegibility of candidates entering the 



INDISPENSABLE MATCH-IVIAKER 37 

marriage pale, there is manifestly little compunc- 
tion of conscience. Here, where insanity and 
leprosy play a remarkable role, the infected parties 
selfishly seek for better blood. Thus whenever such 
a proposal is made — to the parents, of course — 
there involuntarily rises as one of the first queries, 
" Is there any insanity or leprosy contaminating 
that house or person ? " And forthwith secret 
agents are put on the track. But on an island of 
200,000 people, for instance, where hereditary dis- 
eases have for centuries been perpetuated mainly 
by constant intermarriages among its own inhab- 
itants, how can a parent, though ever so wary, be 
sure of escaping this dreaded calamity? 

In Japan almost all marriages are made through 
the medium of the sly old Naka-daclii, or mid- 
dleman, who acts as representative of the god of 
match-making; this important personage may also 
be some cunning, wrinkled-faced female. Mr. 
Hirano, one of our friends, and a rice merchant 
in moderate circimistances, has four daughters. 
*^ Would to the gods they were sons," thinks he. 
The oldest has already been married to a worthy 
youth, who, according to Japanese custom, has be- 
come the adopted son of this home, assuming the 
family name of his wife. But the second daughter, 



S8 WHERE CUPID'S WINGS ARE CLIPPED 

another marriageable lassie, though but yet in her 
teens, is to the anxious old folks another reminder 
of their parental duty. What is to be done? Mr. 
Hirano dons his silken kimono, and, on this occasion 
not forgetting his felt hat so seldom worn, sallies 
forth. 

Squatting behind the paper shoji at the Naha^ 
dachis little cottage, he commissions him to find 
a suitable consort for his daughter. After having 
shrugged his shoulders a few times, the match- 
maker, peering wisely through his horn-rimmed 
glasses, with an assuring smile names to Mr. 
Hirano a dutiful son of a truly worthy family. 
After much parleying and a number of interviews 
with the parents of both houses, the Naha-dacM has 
at last reached the point where he may arrange for 
the mi-ai — ^mutual seeing. The fire of love in the 
hearts of this youthful pair, which has hitherto 
been smouldering under most rigid supervision, 
now leaps into a flickering flame. Accompanied by 
their parents and the Naka-dachi, they meet for the 
first time at a cheerful tea-house, where pattering 
. little waterfalls, rich foliage and decorative paper 
lanterns add a touch of romance to the occasion. 
The young lassie's hair is done in Shimada magi, 
a coiffure considered very charming. Here not one 



COMPELLED TO WED 39 

moment is lost; by darting sidelong glances, young 
man and maiden bring mental struggles into play 
and form opinions of each other. Their elders, 
however, may express their likes and dislikes. How 
frigid and — provoking ! The pair who are the most 
interested have little or nothing to say in the matter, 
and one imagines the whispering notes of connubial 
affection are but faintly heeded. Though meeting 
at a tea-house, the fortunes of this critical hour 
must not be gambled away, even with a cup of tea. 
The old folks having ended their inspection with 
pleasing results, all is joy — though by no means a 
Magara. But pitiful as all this seems to us, yet 
this bride is fortunate compared with many of her 
sisters, who are compelled by their inflexible par- 
ents, in spite of protests, to marry some man whom 
they know and heartily despise, l^ext in order 
was the exchange of betrothal presents, called yuino. 
The young man presented his future wife with a 
lovely obi, silk kimono, a small willow cask, edible 
seaweed, dried cuttlefish, flax, etc. The Naha-dachi, 
leading a caravan of red-faced, sandaled coolies bur- 
dened with these presents, made a halt at the low- 
eaved front of the bride's home. The curiosity of 
the entire neighbourhood was aroused, and, as is 
customary, a gaping crowd with craning necks 



40 WHERE CUPID'S WINGS ARE CLIPPED 

speedily packed the street. Sometimes, however, 
such presents as the above are dispensed with and 
a sum of money ranging from ten to a few hundred 
yen, depending on circumstances, is presented. 

Are there any almanacs in Japan ? Yes, and also 
fortune-tellers, and rather than preferring a rosy 
June day, these are consulted regarding the most 
auspicious day for the wedding. After nightfall 
on that memorable day, the almond-eyed young 
lady, with powdered face and painted lips, donned 
her wedding hood and bridal finery, and, accom- 
panied by her relatives, left the parental roof for 
that of the bridegroom. The procession advanced 
in jinrikishas until they approached a queer-named 
street where Mr. Ogi, the groom^s father, lives. 
Here the bridal party was joyously hailed by a host 
of relatives and friends, all clad in the strictest 
ceremonial silken garments, each carrying a cheer- 
fully beaming paper lantern. In Japan, except 
among Christians, there is absolutely no religious 
service connected with marriage. Of late, how- 
ever, though only among the higher classes, the 
practice of solemnizing the event in a Shinto tem- 
ple has come into vogue. 

Amid an immense throng of curious onlookers, 
the mincing bride was conducted by chubby little 







'1 r . X 


f 




fi^^^^i^^HH^M 


K ^/* '^ ^^^- i^^" 


^I - - 


fl 


^ — .. . . ^ i 


1 


I 


\ ^M 







STRANGE NUPTIAL FEAST 41 

maids — all dressed in lilac and other dainty colours 
— into the brilliantly lighted room, where she was 
greeted by the groom. Seated opposite each other 
on the mats at the Shima-dai, a kind of three- 
legged table but a foot high, on which were effigies 
of an aged couple under pine trees, they alternately 
drank nine little cups of sake; and this constituted 
the marriage ceremony. The nuptial knot being 
tied, they now proceeded to the adjoining, spacious 
room, where they were ceremoniously greeted by 
the expectant host of guests, who squatted on cush- 
ions lined the four sides of the place. These restive 
guests, who during the nuptial ceremony sat in 
solemn silence as though asphyxiated, while now 
partaking of a plenteous repast and imbibing not a 
little sake, became increasingly talkative and hilari- 
ous ; so much so that to him who stood without it 
seemed like a veritable stampede, and w^hich con- 
tinued late into the night. In the meantime, how- 
ever, the bridal pair withdrew to their own apart- 
ment, where they were served a private dinner; 
one indispensable article in the menu being clam 
soup, which although a common dish in Japan, be- 
cause of the fact that each pair of shell hinges never 
fit any other, is considered a felicitous symbol of 
wedded life. 



42 WHERE CUPID'S WINGS ARE CLIPPED 

But this event (though of but yesterday) having 
transpired in a prosperous yet provincial hamlet 
of the interior, custom decreed it that the ivory- 
white teeth of the bride must be painted an ugly 
black and her hair done in a peculiar kind of 
coiffure, signifying that its wearer has entered the 
portals of wedlock; for the same reason her youth- 
ful face was increasingly disfigured by the eye- 
brows being shaven. The heathenish practice of 
blacking teeth, however, is more and more falling 
into disuse through the proper example set by th^ 
former Empress. Mr. G. Watanabe, whose booklet, 
" Marriage Customs in Japan," corroborates the 
above description, also relates quite a number of 
other quaint and outlandish customs pertaining to 
this subject. Some of these, though frankly nar- 
rated by their own writers, being neither a credit 
to the race nor by Western rules of propriety al- 
lowable to reprint, we will mention only two. 

But a few miles from where we have spent quite 
a number of years, a young man, when desirous of 
a helpmeet, has his most intimate friends betake 
themselves in search of one. Having found a suita- 
ble maiden, they first endeavour to persuade her 
to enter the young man's dwelling; but when this 
mild measure fails, they proceed to carry her in 



KIDNAPPING THE BRIDE 43 

by force. Her teeth must uow be blackened, and 
in case she refuses, the dye used for this purpose is 
forced into her mouth by one of her abductors; 
thenceforth she is regarded as irrevocably engaged. 
In another prefecture, it is not deemed advisable 
for the young man to get the first glimpse of his 
future bride in holiday dress. If she is a farmer's 
daughter, the aspiring swain strolls by while she 
is weeding in the narrow-diked paddy field, her 
clothing bespattered and hands and feet besmeared 
with black mud. 



IV 

HAPPY :n^ew year 

NEW YEAR festivities in Japan occupy a 
good deal of time. Since the beginning of 
the Enlightened Era, our Western ISTew 
Year has also come into vogue, and being officially 
recognized as a national holiday, is to-day cele- 
brated by most of the city and town folk. But 
peasants and country people in general are much 
inclined to cling to the old ]^ew Year, as well as 
other time-worn customs. Being reckoned by the 
lunar calendar, it usually falls six weeks behind 
ours. One recent year the police authorities for- 
bade the celebration of the old 'New Year. No 
flag was to be stuck out, no mochi pounded, etc., 
and all meekly acquiesced. In the rural districts, 
however, this change greatly conflicts with the hith- 
erto iron-bound custom of settling business accounts 
at the close of the old calendar year. And that 
old customs die hard was clearly proven by almost 
one and all when the following year the authori- 
ties relaxed the above stringent measures somewhat, 

44 



NEW YEAR— A GOD 45 

and in certain sections where the legal New Year 
was almost ignored, the outlawed one was virtu- 
ally reinstated with old-time zest and much merry- 
making. 

But the commercial excuse for this retrogression 
does not seem to be as weighty as the religious one, 
for it should be remembered that the Japanese 
treat this event as something more than a mere 
holiday. Here they devoutly worship the ]^ew 
Year god. At every gate entrance the farmer 
places little mounds of fresh clay from the hillside, 
on which smouldering incense sticks are planted. 
As to the fishermen, they scour the unpainted sam- 
pans inside and out and stick up a pine branch 
in the centre of each; in the tiny straw-woven cup 
or little wooden tray fastened to either side of the 
hut entrances, samples of the New Year feast are 
scrupulously offered. 

Here authority is all in all. This is clearly 
proven in many other instances besides the above- 
mentioned police regulation. The people are 
taught to implicitly obey their superiors, be it from 
the heart or not, and very often without perceiving 
the shadow of a reason. The clief in the railroad 
dining car, whom we observed wiping his perspir- 
ing face with the dish towel, thought this nothing 



46 HAPPY NEW YEAR 

strange, but was first of all concerned about the 
" rule/' that with this cloth he must wipe the drink- 
ing glasses. The tax official, by a pure mistake of 
his own, supplied us with a tax bill intended for 
another person; but on account of our failure to 
immediately, humbly and most gladly return it, 
when time for payment came and with it the stray 
bill presented, a storm of reprimands was poured 
upon the payor's head. The sentiment seems to be 
this : instead of the government being considered the 
servant of the people, just the reverse is the case. 
Woe be to him who does not assist the tax-gatherer 
or any other servant of the law. 

The police, whose sight is already as magnified 
as that of a Brazilian beetle, still are assisted by 
the people as volunteer detectives. Two tax officials 
come to the foreigner's house, devoid of all Japanese 
etiquette, without knocking or invitation, open the 
front door, crowd into the house and abruptly ask 
the owner concerning his income. Though impo- 
liteness might not have been intended, they con- 
clusively prove that in Japan a man's house is nol 
his castle. But the policeman himself does not al- 
ways understand the rules. At one of the popular 
watering places much frequented by foreigners, no- 
tices are posted, " Bathing without being fully 



POLICE MOODS— DOUGH CAKES 47 

clothed (i.e., body all covered) forbidden.'' A po- 
lice officer read the notice and so obediently went 
for a cooling bath in his starched white uniform, 
but on stepping out of the water, removed his drip- 
ping clothing and leisurely dried himself ! Had he 
not complied with the rule ? 

But now as to the general preparations preceding 
the 'New Year, which lasts from three to five days : 
the people make a sort of bread dough called 
mochi, from a particular kind of rice, which is 
steamed to a soft substance and then pounded for 
hours in a wooden mortar or on a block with long- 
handled pestles. Five or six men are sometimes 
seen exerting their muscular powers around a single 
mortar. Even three or four days before, our neigh- 
bour's vehement pounding causes miniature earth- 
quakes, which reach our dwelling late into the night. 
At last it is before us in loaves or flattened balls, 
white and soft, but really sticky and tasteless, tough 
and indigestible. And when the fact reaches our 
ears that a number of friends are occasionally in- 
disposed on account of such repasts, it occasions us 
not the least surprise. Mochi, when cut in small 
pieces, is either toasted on the fire or cooked in a 
sort of sweetened soup. 

Another preparation for ISTew Year is the paying 



48 HAPPY NEW YEAR 

of all debts, and in the towns particularly, the last 
few nights of the year people take especial pre- 
caution to secure the doors for fear of the burglar, 
who may not be a professional but just a distracted 
poor man seeking the wherewithal to pay his debts. 

Rising at daybreak on New Year, all step out of 
doors, and facing the four points of the compass 
in succession, briskly clap their hands three times 
and then, with the palms held closely together, rever- 
ently bow their heads in formal worship. After 
a hasty breakfast, school children and students meet 
at the schools, where large and small, with their 
teachers, all dressed in their best, meet in the 
spacious auditorium. The national anthem is sung, 
and the pictures of their gracious Emperor and Em- 
press are reverently worshipped. The town and 
court officials also meet at their respective offices, 
and over cups of sahe formally extend their New 
Year greetings. 

The duty of making New Year calls usually de- 
volves upon the men and boys. The " callers " 
strangely deviate from the ordinary mode of punc- 
tilious Japanese etiquette. They either walk or 
ride in jinrikishas to the dwellings to be called upon^ 
and hastening into the entrance through the open 
lattice doors, throw their visiting cards into a re- 




FIREMEN S ANTICS ON NEW YEARS DAY 



ZODIAC ON POSTCARDS 49 

ceptacle, and rush out again, seldom greeting the 
inmates. On account of so many friends to be 
visited, everybody seems of necessity to be in vehe- 
ment haste, which in a way denudes this beautiful 
custom of much of its sanctity and sincerity. In 
the use of calling cards, the Japanese have by far 
outdone the West. Common artisans and little 
shopkeepers even, use them throughout the year, 
but the 'New Year caller, be he coolie or servant, 
schoolboy or student, all have their cards. Business 
men in the larger towns are often seen with a 
servant carrying a whole box full, following in 
their wake. 

Then there are the lN"ew Year postcards, which 
have an enormous circulation all over the Empire. 
The years here being designated by their ancient 
signs of the Zodiac, these cards bear elaborate de- 
signs in keeping with this special year symbol. 
Thus the 1910 cards had engravings of the dog 
in a remarkable variety. The next sign is the wild 
boar, then the rat, the cow, tiger, rabbit, dragon, 
snake, horse, sheep, monkey and chicken. Decora- 
tions of this season are distinctive and unique. The 
national flag is hoisted near every doorway and 
twigs of pine are tied to either post, or sections of 
thick olive-green bamboo, with a branch of a plum 



50 HAPPY NEW YEAR 

tree, are stuck into a cone-shaped little sand pile 
on both sides of the rustic gate; either a skilfully 
wrought, horn-shaped twist of rice straw, or a 
fringe of straw with ferns and queer-shaped pieces 
of white paper tied to it^ is stretched across the 
gateway. 

Be the ^New Year celebrated in the more balmy 
sections of the country or amid the snow and ice 
near Tokyo and farther north, the people are al- 
ways found in exuberant, joyful, and if at no other 
time, at least now, in conciliatory spirits. All 
dress in their best, and when the Japanese gentle- 
man appears in his immaculate native costume, it 
is as greatly to his credit as the often ill-fitting for- 
eign suit is the very opposite. Frequently when 
not in foreign costume, he insists on donning a pair 
of shoes or a felt or " stovepipe '' hat, often a few 
sizes too large, thus transforming his graceful habit 
into a ridiculous one. 

Our friends and acquaintances, both young and 
old, bring 'New Year greetings to our home, and the 
missionary returns the same. The customary salu- 
tation, ''^ Shin nen wa omedeto gosarimasu/' bursts 
everywhere, in joyful notes, upon our ears, and 
which translated literally, amounts to this : " As 
to the New Year, august felicitation is " ; and sub- 



EXQUISITE DECORATIONS 51 

ordinate to this one may be heard such as, " Hon- 
ourably condescend to be good to me another year." 
At the entrance to the houses of the better classes 
may be seen exquisite bits of decoration; perhaps 
the entire front room is thrown open, where, upon 
the matted floors, stand stuffed cranes, also dwarfed 
pines and other evergreens in clay vases, on old- 
fashioned lacquered stands. The background may 
be a big folding screen of many sections, the panels 
sprinkled with gold, and amid other scenery a large 
covey of storks in the forefront. Another entrance, 
which all the rest of the year may be closed, is 
now swung wide open, revealing an unvarnished 
hardwood staircase and floor, planed to a polish, 
leading to the aesthetically decorated guest chamber, 
upon whose immaculately clean white mats stands 
a large panelled crimson screen, splashed with gold, 
on which in rich colours a gnarly, coarse-barked 
Japanese umbrella pine is sketched in bold relief. 
In front of the screen stands a plain but expensively 
lacquered tray — the receptacle for the cards of the 
New Year well-wishers. While performing our 
share of calls, among which the Christian believers 
had the first claim, we should have found it much 
more difficult, amid the labyrinth of small houses 
in narrow streets and passages, to locate some of 



52 HAPPY NEW YEAR 

the poorer friends, had it not been that they, amid 
other little bits of decoration in the entrance, had 
placed the open Bible in a conspicuous place as 
the receptacle for the cards. 

So much for the first day. The second is usually 
made a time of sake drinking and general merry- 
making. Even those who would not dare to indulge 
in a spree at any other time, feel as though the 
ISFew Year would not be befittingly ushered in with- 
out a drinking bout. Where intoxication in the 
West often leads otherwise thoughtful mortals to 
give vent to pugnaciousness and vociferous and 
vitriolic excesses of language, salce seldom renders 
these little brown carousers vicious, but simply 
hilarious and silly, and with rubicund, beaming 
faces they may stagger about, even pledging friend- 
ship to total strangers. We were but a few days 
in Japan when one of these bibulous fellows met us 
on the street car. He suspected our calling, and 
appeared greatly ashamed of his condition. In 
spite of frequent declinations, he forced upon us 
various tokens of friendliness. First it was an 
orange, then a second and a third, then came an 
egg, followed by a few more in succession — all raw ! 

But drinking sahe and smoking diminutive pipes 
is only part of the festivities. Men from all walks 



SERENADING ANCESTORS 53 

of life, with their wives and children and friends, 
make a bee-line for the shrines. Prominent and 
haughty officials, whom one would suspect of being 
almost anything except religiously inclined, meekly 
bow before wood and stone. A modern brass band 
may be seen serenading before some ancestral 
shrine. The homuso, an old-time begging minstrel 
with a basket-shaped straw mask over his head, and 
in white gloves rendering a few bars on a bamboo 
lute in front of each decorated gate, may be suc- 
ceeded by a group of professional story-tellers. Pro- 
cessions throng the streets; fire-brigades in pictur- 
esque holiday dress perform antics on tall, bamboo 
ladders, and boys with kites and girls playing at 
shuttlecock, complete this Eastern scene. 



CURIOUS STREET SCEISTES 

WHEINT we first landed in Japan, and stand- 
ing in the narrow streets, looked into the 
faces of a lot of little people, we were 
enchanted and amazed. Though now no longer a 
newcomer, the novelty of these quaint Oriental 
streets still affords not a little diversion. The little 
shops and booths, places which, though so small, 
contain a thousand and one things, are unfailing in 
their charm. Here, with great deftness the green- 
grocer and fruit-seller have arranged their wares, 
resembling from a distance a huge bouquet. There, 
the flower shop blazes in brilliance, and the lantern 
maker squats at his multicoloured task. The car- 
penter, the tinner — all in cramped quarters and 
usually in sitting posture — are shaving and clip- 
ping away. At the next entrance we perhaps see 
a man severing chicken meat from the bone, per- 
forming the operation as skilfully as the surgeon 
with his dissecting knife. Beef and other meats 
are commonly sold in this fashion. The smithy, 

54 



LABYRINTH OF SHOES 55 

also, where old irons, burrs and bars are stuck up 
on the walls and where the little puny man sitting 
on the dirt floor works the bellows with his toes, 
with powdered charcoal creating a little fire as 
though he meant to warm a teapot, and leisurely 
heating an iron, with his little hammer pecking on 
an excuse of an anvil, he produces a faint, ex- 
hausted clink. Alas for that cheerful forge, with 
its showers of flashing sparks, the joy of our child- 
hood days! 

Two or three paces farther on one is confronted 
with a typical Japanese shoe store. All the foot- 
wear of the little brown man is here on view. The 
geta — wooden clogs — and straw sandals are indeed 
a fanciful exhibition. They line the benches, the 
floors, the shelves. They hang from above, and 
seemingly are everywhere, allowing the seller just 
about room enough to coil up on his cushion. Thfe 
newcomer is at once startled at the immense quan- 
tity of this simple footwear and the many places 
where it is sold ; but he soon finds a solution to his 
query when he hears that a Japanese man annually 
makes away with from eight to ten pairs. Upon 
first arriving, we would now and then hear a man 
trot along on his geta^ and invariably thought it 
was a high-stepper horse pacing down the street. 



56 CURIOUS STREET SCENES 

It is neither sootliing to the nerves, nor does it seem 
decorous in a Westerner's eyes, to notice a bevy 
of richly dressed ladies, while walking pigeontoed 
to a fearful degree, noisily and with utter uncon- 
cern, rattle and drag their geta over a hard pave- 
ment. And what thunder a hurrying throng can 
produce when crossing a wooden bridge ! 

Yonder is a shrewd-looking vegetable pedlar 
whose deep-furrowed face is as coarse in grain as 
the bark of an oak. At night, in ancient grotesque 
garb, and assisted by a samisen player, he gives lit- 
tle theatrical performances at a newly opened 
booth; in daytime, however, he carries loads heavy 
enough for a horse, and with quick step walks from 
street to street, still having sufficient energy to call 
out his wares as he goes. One marvels at those 
wonderful, big, snow-white radishes he sells; also 
his green onions, carrots, fruits, and even lotus roots, 
dug from the muddy bottoms of ponds. Fancy 
yourself eating long burdock roots which grow in 
any country back yard! The Japanese consider 
these a toothsome article, and the pedlar fetches 
them from the farmer, who raises them like turnips. 
Another vendor vehemently shouts, " Bamboo chil- 
dren ! " Of course he means young, crisp bamboo 
sprouts, which are sold in sizes from six inches to 



TOOTHSOME TUBERS 57 

a foot long, and frequently thicker tlian an ear of 
com. 

In the booth on the corner of yon cross-road, as 
soon as frost is nipping the noses, two or three 
little men are busily engaged baking and selling 
delicious sweet potatoes in slices or whole. Though 
there are many such stores all over town, this one 
alone markets nearly 300 pounds every day of the 
season. Immense crowds of ruddy, and mostly bare- 
headed school children and youths, passing, create 
the briskest of trades. Be it on a cold rainy day, 
when each comes on high, stilted geta, with that 
novel and picturesque paper umbrella; or again 
when biting winds from the sea whip around the 
low-roofed houses and through narrow passages — 
tingling fingers and bare, chubby ankles — if these 
lads and lassies possess but a quarter of a cent, it is 
quite sure to be expended here. And never was 
there a wiser outlay of pennies ; for when that stoop- 
ing little man lifts a wooden lid and out of the flat 
iron pan placed over a heap of glowing charcoals 
spears those toothsome tubers with a metal chop- 
stick and places them in eager, little brown hands, 
they serve a double purpose — diffusing a pleasant 
warmth through chilly fingers and then filling the 
gastronomical cavity. 



58 CURIOUS STREET SCENES 

Orientalism is graphically depicted around a big, 
flat-stone-curbed well, the meeting place of the 
neighbourhood women, who come with their babies 
on their backs, to get water, wash their rice, their 
clothes and any other thing ; but, as it seems, espe- 
cially to gossip. Then add a miscellaneous troop 
of scantily dressed youngsters, careless of the wab- 
bling heads of the babies strapped on their backs 
and rending the air with vociferous shouts while 
at play under a burning meridian sun, and you have 
a most tempting bit of realistic scenery for the 
kodak. The streets themselves — sometimes they are 
gravelled, but being narrow there is no room for 
shade trees nor sidewalks; rainy weather necessi- 
tates ploughing through deep, black slime. Houses 
and shops are unpainted and generally dingy-look- 
ing. Here and there the front of long structures, 
perhaps even a rich man's home, looks unusually 
shabby and squalid. Store and house entrances 
are level with the low, muddy street, and every- 
where the air is defiled by filthy cesspools and 
ditches. 

'' Fire ! Eire ! ! '' So everybody shouts, and 
noiseless sandals as well as clattering geta all make 
a bee-line in that direction. An antiquated hand 
pump is dragged along by the ^^ brigade," whose 



SOLEMN FIRE BRIGADE 59 

banners, consisting of big lanterns, strung up on 
bamboo poles, solemnly proceed, though the clang 
of a bronze bell suspended between tall double tim- 
bers, and operated by a little old man with a wooden 
mallet, urges them to speed. Our next-door neigh- 
bour woman returns from this exciting scene and 
proceeds to describe the event in detail. Her part- 
ner evidently listens with mute astonishment, and 
after genuine Japanese fashion simply punctuates 
each sentence with ^' hm ! '' and at times, to reveal 
her intense interest, utters ^' hm, HM ! " with 
greater vehemence. While this is ostensibly done as 
a matter of politeness, it frequently also reveals an 
undesirable trait — that of secretively absorbing out- 
side information but imparting none. 

We must not overlook the modern brass band. 
Their predecessors are yet known, marching tan- 
dem through the streets, beating various-shaped 
metals and a drum or two. The whole outfit re- 
minds one of youngsters beating tin pans. This 
modern brass band, however, has somewhat improved 
things and seems to be a better drawing card. Such 
a band usually consists of three or four instruments, 
a bass and a snare drum, a bass horn and sometimes 
a cornet. The music is various and often at vari- 
ance. Of course they cannot be very " choicy," 



60 CURIOUS STREET SCENES 

since their selections are usually confined to 
" Marching through Georgia " and the like, Avith a 
few Japanese ditties, and as some one has said, 
" They play them with a fine disregard of appro- 
priateness, as wedding marches as well as funeral 
consolations." 

We just caught three or four men practising on 
a band-stand in the near-by park. Two of these 
incorrigible mimics of Western ways were quite 
adept with the drums, but they needed just one 
more instrument, and the cheapest they had found 
was a little baby accordion. They were evidently 
taking great pains to initiate a third man into the 
art of playing upon it. We watched — and under- 
stood. The simple instructions were to draw it 
back and forth in accompaniment with their drums ! 
We did not linger — the efforts of this new per- 
former being a little too original for us. 

Speaking of this park (it being on the beach), 
it is, during the summer especially, the rendezvous 
of all strata of society. Though here not a sprig 
of grass may grow, young and old find in the shade 
of these tall pines ample room for rest and play. 
The beach also affording splendid opportimities for 
sea-bathing, students of both sexes, accompanied by 
their respective teachers, all properly clad, here 



PRIMEVAL CUSTOMS 61 

have their swimming drills. But another class, 
both men and women, who maintain the ancient and 
more common view of propriety, are also well repre- 
sented here. Though living but a half block from 
the sea, on account of above conditions, the writer 
has found it exceedingly difficult to take bis chil- 
dren out for an enviable sea bath. A woman lei- 
surely moving out of the water, slipping on her 
geta, and raising a fine silk parasol, clad only in 
these indispensable articles, proceeding to a bench 
in the park, where she dons the rest of her apparel, 
is only a sample of what commonly occurs in many 
places. 

But however amazing the foreigner may find 
these unique sights, lie also seems to be a never- 
ending curiosity. At times when stopping at a 
shop, crowds of young and old, some standing at a 
distance, others getting within a few feet, will glare 
into one's face and features with as much com- 
placency as though they were reading a billposter. 
But it must be remembered that this incivility is 
generally unintentional. Just for a little amuse- 
ment, however, we have at times returned the gaze, 
glowering at our hypnotized inspectors with all in- 
tensity, till they, becoming suddenly conscious of 
the fact that they were an equal curiosity to us. 



6^ CURIOUS STREET SCENES 

completely collapsed, and with eyes dropped to the 
ground beat a hasty retreat. 

I^ature is now shrouded in darkness and the 
sandman has already closed many thousand pairs 
of dusky little eyes. But through the murky gloom 
and sea fog even, one is sure to obtain some fas- 
cinating peeps at the quaint little dwellers and 
their clustering huts of thatch and tile. Returning 
from a stereopticon exhibition of the Life of Christ, 
given in an open space amid hundreds of fishermen 
compounds, our way led through many zigzag pas- 
sages and on across an erstwhile cemetery of the 
near-by temple. But the priests, in dire financial 
straits, had had thousands of slabs and tombstones 
removed to a crowded corner and nearly the entire 
area of this " God's Acre " sold. Packs of wolfish- 
looking dogs with glaring eyes and bristling necks, 
making their nocturnal prowls, scented the for- 
eigner's tracks. Within close range, where we 
stood, they gathered in a howling conference and 
snapped at and bit each other and profaned this 
" temple of silence." 

Here and there we hear a ramming and a slam- 
ming; which means that although it is a sultry 
summer night, l^ippon's old custom wills that the 
slavish little wife or chubby servant girl closel}' seal 



NIGHT PROWLERS 63 

up the house with those big rain-doors. Reaching 
home, we hear from the neighbour's barn the ter- 
rific shouts of grown-up and smaller boys practising 
"ju-jitsu." We retire, but nature is not yet all 
ait rest. ITatives pass noisily by on their geta; soon 
some rattling jinrikisha, creating a noise unlike 
anything else in the world, are bowling up to the 
near-by hotel. And now what a thunder ! The little 
postman with tiny little lantern and sandalled feet, 
in genuine " post haste " has come, pounding the 
rain-doors. We reluctantly rise ; but cheered by the 
hope of good news from home, we descend to re- 
ceive only an advertisement. 

In the small hours of the night, some blocks 
away, we hear the loud and hideous yells of an 
insane woman, who, like many such unfortunates 
in this country, is not confined. She passes our 
house, uttering blood-curdling and infernal threats. 
More soothing is the croaking of the frogs in the 
near-by rice field, as is the soft sighing of the wind 
through the grand old pines and the gentle " swish- 
swash " of the waves against the sandy beach. 
Later on we are reminded that it is not yet morn- 
ing, as the night watchman passes on his rounds, 
striking with his club against the fences and the 
doors of the houses. In other places these guardians 



64^ CURIOUS STREET SCENES 

sometimes keep step to the music of two flat pieces 
of hard wood, which they clap together, or else carry 
a hollow steel rod and piston, which they strike 
every step or two upon the pavement, making a 
noise which must be heard to be appreciated. Just 
about daybreak, a company of women in quick 
march and ringing bells ascend the near-by hill on 
a pilgrimage. In the adjoining yards we hear the 
clapping of hands, and we know that, standing in 
the open air, our neighbours, facing the rising sun 
(which selfsame orb our friends at home saw sink 
behind the western hills some nine short hours be- 
fore) are zealously offering their morning prayers. 



VI 

PILGRIMS AND PILGRIMAGES 

•'^TRANGERS and pilgrims on the earth— 
k^% seek a country " — this has a Biblical 
chime ; " weary wanderer," " pilgrim's 
staff," " low-crowned hat," " cowl and cape " — 
these also sound poetical. But in Japan, that pil- 
grimages, one of the cardinal features of its ancient 
worship, still play such a mighty role, discloses the 
melancholy fact that there remain millions of mor- 
tals who have not yet been rescued from the slimy, 
black ooze of diabolical superstition. Some of these 
pilgrimages are made throughout the entire year, 
while others only at certain seasons or anniversaries. 
At such special occasions various parts of Japan 
are literally swarming. The outfit of these plebeian 
devotees is generally as follows : a blank book, con- 
sisting of a number of sheets tied together for the 
purpose of obtaining the impress of the seal of each 
temple visited, a little brass bell, a straw mat, a 
miniature pair of sandals made of straw or paper, a 
satchel or a box for the tickets and a small pot of 

63 



66 PILGRIMS AND PILGRIMAGES 

paste with which to affix the same to the holy places. 

In appearance the pilgrim is anything but im- 
posing. A Japanese professor in a eulogy of his 
race declared that their physical ugliness in reality 
constitutes one of the chief elements of strength 
which the nation possesses. !N^ow whether the gen- 
eral run of this people are really ugly, we leave for 
them to state; but admitting that there is little 
beauty found among the rank and file, these strag- 
gling wanderers, isolated or in bands, often pre- 
sent in their pilgrim garb a pitiful and unsightly 
appearance. They are usually a bowed-down, hol- 
low-cheeked and sickly crew, and their tight muslin 
pantaloons, clinging to their short legs, conspicu- 
ously reveal the fact that a goodly number of them 
could not successfully drive a drove of pigs. 

!N"ot a small proportion of the regular pilgrims 
belong to the army of 100,000 lepers said to be in 
this country. With swollen, aching limbs and un- 
sightly blotches here and there, or lumpy growths 
on neck or side of face, they drag themselves from 
village to village and from shrine to shrine. Every 
day we must handle the filthy copper coins, so many 
of which pass through their fingers ; on all kinds of 
public conveyances we may touch the appurtenances 
which their blighting hands have contaminated. 



BASKET-SHAPED HATS 67 

Then, are we ever immune from this plague when 
eating or sleeping in Japanese hotels ? 

The pilgrims' headgear consists of a straw- 
coloured, broad-brimmed, basket-shaped hat woven 
of reeds. They either carry a long, plain staff or 
one with metallic rings from the temple fastened to 
the top. Pilgrimages in Japan are not so much a 
gloomy rite as those of the Burman or Hindoo. 
Their love for nature and travel, and their modern 
restlessness afford them, when going in bands to- 
gether, exercise conducive to health, and a knowl- 
edge regarding things, places and people which 
they would likely not otherwise obtain. It must 
not be forgotten, however, that the idea of penance 
is by no means lacking. Wearisome are the bulky 
burdens saddled on their backs and enervating and 
heart-sickening some of their lonely distant jour- 
neys. Again, a large class can be found revolving 
around temple courts, or reciprocating between tem- 
ple gate and shrine a hundred or even a thousand 
times, dropping a bamboo tally at each round, and 
offering their prayers in a loud, despairing wail. 

In feudal times, among the common people, " pil- 
grims alone were free to travel beyond the 
boundaries of their province. Consequently many 
went out in pilgrim's dress, largely with the object 



6S PILGRIMS AND PILGRIMAGES 

of seeing the world, or in search of missing fathers, 
murderers or thieves." Indeed, theirs was also a 
religious purpose, but for the above-named designs 
especially, the cloak of religion was found useful. 
To-day even, the object may be the restoration of 
some sick child, etc. During the late war many 
became pilgrims in the hope of securing the soldiers' 
safe return. Buddhist temples and Shinto shr^^.^ 
are alike resorted to, as since the Meiji Era any 
distinction between them has been quite lost. And 
really they sing the Buddhist chant while climbing 
to the eyrie of a mountain god, and often supplica- 
tion is offered at a shrine to quite a wrong deity. 

One would imagine these religious " tramps," 
hungry for the Bread of Life, but poor mortals! 
Suckled by superstition, their pagan creed is like 
the lightning rod, warding off the thunderbolts of 
God's Spirit. A wandering priest with his boy 
acolyte passed our house every winter night during 
nearly two months previous to the Chinese 'New 
Year, and while walking, in a loud, plaintive mono- 
tone they mumbled a " vain repetition," and stop- 
ping at the doors of sympathizers, rang their tiny 
bells. Another instance we recall is that of a verita- 
ble ecclesiastic with tall mitre and stilted clogs, who 
during a similar period nightly stalked the high- 



ARENA OF THE GODS 69 

ways, blowing a mammoth conch shell. But on the 
longed-for 'New Year Day, these zealots did not 
forget to reap their harvests from the hands of those 
whose domiciles they had purged of their malicious 
demons. 

The pilgrims on Awaji visit hacM-ju-hahka' 
sho — (eighty-eight sacred places), but these are 
mere reproductions of the eighty-eight sacred spots 
of Shikoku, a neighbouring island. Indeed there 
are reproductions of reproductions. On the pre- 
cincts of a single hill may be found those sacred sites 
marked by little shrines, thus enabling the pilgrim 
to complete his task in a few hours, where originally 
it would entail the waste of an entire month. Many 
of these pilgrims have shown relentless zeal all 
through their lives. One, for instance, had com- 
pleted the entire pilgrimage of 88 temples 650 
times, which figures 57,200 different temple visits, 
and a walking distance of over 23,000 miles. 

Moreover, on certain special occasions great multi- 
tudes of school children, led by their teachers, com- 
panies and almost regiments of soldiers, with their 
officers, governmental dignitaries. University grad- 
uates and the rich in their silken robes, by train 
or steamboat proceed to some famous Mecca like 
Ise or Kotohira or the Kyoto temples. But the pro- 



70 PILGRIMS AND PILGRIMAGES 

fessionals also, in their distinctive pilgrim garL and 
with heavy-beaded rosaries strung about their necks, 
flock to these favourite goals; crawling up steep 
mountain heights, great droves may be found near 
springs or lakelets where they sometimes bivouac. 
Ere reaching the sacred pinnacles, they invariably 
stop to change their straw sandals and wash their 
hands, that they may not trespass on the god's do- 
main in an impure state. 

Spring may be arrayed in its garlands of cherry 
blossoms ; the mountains be covered with the glorious 
rhododendron; wistaria, lagerstroemia (sarusuheri) 
and peonies adorn the temple courts, and the pil- 
grim, ascending a long avenue of ivy-clad pine or 
cryptomeria lined with artistic stone lanterns, could 
from the height attained, like Moses of old, in rap- 
ture view the glorious scenery of mountain, sea and 
sky; but here many have been accustomed to retire 
to a certain enclosure and fast for an entire week, 
no other refreshment being allowed them but the 
use of a cooling bath. Many climb the steeps of 
Euji-yama, and betaking themselves before dawn 
to a particular elevation on the sacred mount, await 
the glorious sunrise. When the ruby orb looms 
up out of the broad, blue Pacific they greet it de- 
voutly with muttered prayers and rubbing of 



THE PILGRIM SHIRT 71 

rosaries. Some make a circuit of thirty-three tem- 
ples of the goddess Kwannon, scattered over vari- 
ous parts of the country and arriving at the last, 
they accordingly deposit their erstwhile snowy pil- 
grim shirt. 

Ordinarily these junrei are composed of el- 
derly people; but at certain seasons of the year, 
in the rural districts, bands of bright and vigorous 
young men — a little more modernly dressed — as 
well as modest-looking young maidens, whose vari- 
coloured garb is also a deviation from the old cus- 
tom, under the leadership of a priest walking with 
solemn stride and distinguished by his immense, 
black-painted straw hat the size of a half-bushel, 
can be found ardently and joyfully ringing their 
bells and chanting en masse in front of a dilapidated 
shrine. Be their devotion deep-seated or only spas- 
modic, their appearance as pilgrims peculiarly ap- 
peals to the Christian's sympathy. ^' There is rest 
for the weary." 



VII 
MUSICAL ECCENTEICITIES 

WHEj^ only a day in Japan, and after hav- 
ing passed through a typical crowded 
Oriental street, we, amid other points, at 
least guessed one correctly. Returning to the ho- 
tel, we stated to our friend our great disappoint- 
ment that the Japanese were not a musical people. 
Another shall describe a vocal effort made by an 
aspiring youth : " It was one of those wailing bal- 
lads, half soprano, half falsetto, and certain passages 
of it, had they been intended for a music-hall imi- 
tation of a tom-cat on the tiles, would have been a 
marvellously clever performance. I was assured, 
however, that the singer's voice was an unusually 
good one." Fishermen, coolies, merchants and 
students even, passing our house late into the night, 
singing all sorts of ditties, corroborate the above 
description. To a foreigner's ears these renderings 
are a most agonizing performance; the strains con- 
sist mainly of prolonged grunts and vibrating 

73 




PERFORMING OX GekkiH AND Samiseu 



EXASPERATING TUNES 73 

" !N'o's/' to which but a few gulps of sahe add not 
a little tinge of heathenishness. 

But that these " tunes " are beyond the pianist^s 
skill is accounted for by the fact that Japanese 
classical music is anything but a science. It is more 
a combination of squeals and coos, and, rather than 
soothing, it exasperates a Westerner's feelings. It 
neither exhibits the majesty of the major, nor the 
plaintive softness of the minor strains. Present to 
an ordinary crowd a piece of Western music, ren- 
dered in its various parts, and it is like one of their 
own proverbs, " As giving guineas to a cat." In- 
deed the music taught in the schools to-day is set 
somewhat after Western fashion, but it does not 
supply the want of the people. It is seldom tried 
at home as a social factor. In the West people find 
their enjoyment in religious or popular music writ- 
ten by men of culture and experience; but com- 
posers of popular music in Japan, as a rule, *' be- 
long to the ignorant and uneducated class ; it savors 
of vulgarity and is popularized only by the geisha/' 
Of course none will deny that there are screeches 
in Occidental music. Once we opened the way for 
a high school principal to frankly give his opinion 
of our music by first kindly criticising theirs; and 



74 MUSICAL ECCENTRICITIES 

he retorted tliat foreign music was too noisy and 
devoid of variation. 

Here are sung translations from Chinese classics 
— in later years also some from English authors. 
A miscellaneous collection of tiny odes, called 
uta — ^mostly composed of seventeen or thirty-one 
syllables — are sung with little variation of tone. 
Sometimes these vocalists appear to be imitating 
a ventriloquist, or again drag along in monotone 
with admirable bass voices. Then there is also what 
is known as utai, a sort of lyric poetry. But 
from days of yore these little friendly people, in 
their longing to give vent to simple strains of mirth, 
could all draw on their peculiarly fitting supply of 
classified ballads. Here were farmer songs, coolie 
songs, songs for children, for nurses, for dances, 
congratulations, festivals and temples; included 
also were the man with his mountain pack-horse, the 
woodchopper and sailor. It is rather amusing some- 
times to hear a native evangelist sing a solo in what 
we would term a ^' helter-skelter " fashion, without 
irritating one single ear or even provoking a smile 
in his appreciative audience, squatted on the matted 
floor. When first arriving among this novel people, 
their music, like many other strange things, we 
could only describe in superlatives. We have known 



"HELTER-SKELTER" SOLO 75 

a young preacher to start a hymn, but widely miss- 
ing the mark, nevertheless wade manfully and alone 
through the first verse, and then, to our astonish- 
ment, draw a long breath and start in on the next 
one, and so on through the whole song, composing 
his music (?) as he went along ! What they lack in 
ability they certainly make up in self-confidence and 
perseverance. But because of the younger genera- 
tion, who at school have learned better, at least 
mechanically, and also as a result of the training 
given to the many thousands of Sunday school 
youths, singing of the good old Christian hymns at 
the missions, and especially so in the older estab- 
lished churches, has attained a remarkably praise- 
worthy type. 

Most of the musical instruments, lutes, flutes, 
drums and fiddles, were imported from China. Be- 
sides, there are two others, on one of which, at least, 
most daughters of fairly well-to-do families in this 
country learn to play — ^the samisen and the koto. 
The samisen — a kind of banjo — is said to have 
hailed from Manila. It has a square-shaped body, 
covered with catskin, with head and neck made of 
rosewood. It is played with a triangular piece of 
wood or ivory, and the musician, who usually takes 
a kneeling position on a mat, unless walking from 



76 MUSICAL ECCENTRICITIES 

door to door, may produce an astonishing variety of 
tones, often extremely weird and plaintive. The 
koto is far more elaborate, often costing a hundred 
dollars or more. It is a low box about seven feet 
long and one foot wide, constructed of a hard wood 
called hiri. " It has thirteen strings, each with a 
bridge; it is tuned by shifting the bridges, and 
played by means of small pieces of ivory attached 
to the first three fingers of the hands of the player, 
who kneels on the floor before it." The notes of 
this instrument have a pleasing effect and somewhat 
resemble the harp. 

We were once invited to a musicale at a Girls' 
Normal School. We went and received most grati- 
fying impressions. The young ladies in crowds met 
the guests at a rustic, arched entrance, and with 
peculiar, Japanese grace welcomed them. Having 
entered the principal's room, the gentleman told us 
over a cup of tea that the American-style cake on 
the table before us was made by the students. Be- 
ing yet a little early, we were escorted to one of 
the halls in the great building, where drawings, 
fancy needlework and artificial flowers, the work 
of the students, were exhibited. The time for the 
exercises having arrived, we were led to the au- 
ditorium and offered a front seat, where we were 



WORSHIPPING A DOCUMENT 77 

confronted bj the most prominent gentlemen of the 
town, some dressed in foreign style and others in 
Japanese. The bell tapped and the principal made 
a few preliminary remarks, after which the audi- 
ence rose and sang the national anthem. Being a 
long-metred tune, and sung at a low pitch, the audi- 
ence, with the students, rendered the whole with 
such tenderness and swaying power that even a 
patriotic American felt the effects of it. And why 
not? It was their best expression of homage to 
their worshipful Emperor. 

Immediately after this, the principal walked to 
the front of the rostrum, where upon the desk was 
a little stand, made of exquisitely planed but un- 
painted wood, and bearing a little box. He made 
a low bow, then ascended, removed from the box 
a blue cloth wrapping, and raising the lid with one 
hand, as carefully as though it were dynamite, with 
the other lifted out the contents, and like the Cath- 
olic priest raising the crucifix, he reverently held 
it to his head, bowing to the same. " What is this 
wonderful object ? " we asked ourselves. Our 
neighbour volunteered the information. " This is 
the Emperor's Rescript on Education," he said. 
The principal opened a roll, and in a monotone dis- 
tinctly read this worthy document. Closing, he re- 



78 MUSICAL ECCENTRICITIES 

placed the covering and made another bow, after 
which one of the teachers carried the little shrine 
out of the room. 

The program of the evening consisted of twenty- 
eight numbers — some splendid renderings of song 
and music by the students composing the greater 
part. They showed efficiency on instruments such 
as the organ, piano and violin; but with nothing 
were we so well pleased as to hear these students, 
in companies of fifteen or twenty, sing alternately 
various selections in soprano, alto and bass. After 
the whole was ended, and the audience dispersed 
through the corridors, the students again made them- 
selves conspicuous by their extreme courtesy. Down 
the long, brick-paved pathway, they stood at in- 
tervals with cheerful, beaming paper lanterns, and 
as the guests departed, all in their turn made a silent 
bow. 



yiii 

FISHES AND FISHEEMEN 

O'N'E morning when the noise of the rolling 
waves thundered through the old pines near 
our dwelling, our neighbour fisherman, with 
keen, experienced eye glancing over the water's sur- 
face, discovered a great school of sardines. He 
raised a shout which was taken up by others far- 
ther on and on and which rose louder and louder 
till all the fisher folk of the neighbourhood hastily 
gathered on the beach, preparing the boats with 
their cargo of immense long seines, measuring over 
two hundred feet in length. As one gang tossed 
out upon the deep, encircling the fishes, the yell in 
the settlement still continued till the last woman 
and child responded to the muster. 

One tottering old man, who understood his busi- 
ness, engineered these stalwart men and buoyant 
youths with grace and ease. A word or two — and 
the whole squad moved as one man; not because 
they were hired but on account of respecting age. 
With long strong ropes, two gangs on the shore 

79 



80 FISHES AND FISHERMEN 

drew in the ends of the net. How they tugged and 
grunted! The draught was a very unusual one 
and sometimes when the massive waves would lift 
the big net, bulging with fishes, the crowd became 
hilarious. Well knowing that they could not drag 
such a cargo up the sand beach, young striplings 
as well as venerable old sea veterans plunged into 
the water and with great difiiculty moved the net 
slowly forward. The net broke; and these fisher- 
men, much of the time under water, held up the 
torn meshes above the surface, while others, with 
huge bamboo baskets, hastily lugged the booty up to 
the shore and dumped it into empty boats. But oh, 
the millions of sardines that escaped! The waves 
along the beach were alive with them. Delightful 
must have been the feast of the boys and girls dwell- 
ing in every home in that vicinity who swooped 
down upon the beach with pots and all sorts of 
vessels to pick up the sardines washed up in heaps 
on the sand. Boat after boat was filled, and yet it 
seemed so long till the nets were emptied; feeble 
old men continued working in the cold deep till they 
were blue and trembling and utterly exhausted. 

This was a red-letter day — and a big, bright-red 
flag in the shape of a fish was hoisted on the beach. 
With these hunters of the sea, unusual success is 



FIERY PHANTOM SHIP 81 

generally followed by feasting and drinking sahe. 
Out to sea they went in a big boat, rowed by some 
ten men. Red banners floated in the air, and the 
crowd, almost more than the craft could carry, 
lazily tossed about on the water, shouting and sing- 
ing their unmelodious ditties. But at night this 
scene was far more splendid w^hen the masts and 
the rigging of the boat were strung with glowing 
red paper lanterns, appearing to the stranger like 
a fiery moving phantom upon the dark waves of the 
deep. 

Take the fisherman where you wiU, he is always 
a most interesting character. Grand the familiar 
scene when, on some autumnal evening, down 
through the bushy limbs of long-leaved pine trees, 
from a moonless sky stars gleam in regal splendour, 
and through the murky twilight the eye sweeping 
over the bay near our home^ from headland to head- 
land and beyond, gazes upon a thousand starry 
twinkling lights which mark a thousand fisher sam- 
pans bobbing on the rippling waters. 

But these little men also hunt their prey in day- 
time. They go out in small gangs and in different 
directions; or again, here and there fleets of two 
or three hundred of these three-cornered boats with 
their double-acting paddles can be seen plying on 



82 FISHES AND FISHERMEN 

an area of but tAventy acres. These from a distance 
on a placid sea have the appearance of a great herd 
of cattle on the Western plains. Again the scene 
changes when with the lowering sky and at signs of 
an oncoming storm, far out in the deep, hoisting 
their little square sails, they make a bee-line for the 
distant shore^ from whence they appear like so many 
com shocks in a wide, wide field on a foggy ^N^ovem- 
ber day. 

Aside from the ordinary sampan, now and then 
a larger one, though of similar pattern and oars, is 
put into use. When landing, these, like the smaller 
ones, are drawn up the sloping sand beach where 
thundering breakers can do no harm and where the 
unpainted hull can be frequently scoured clean. 
The reader would greatly enjoy seeing one of these 
bigger smacks landed ; every man, woman and child 
of the fishing haram must come to the rescue — and 
whether pulling much or little, all must somewhere 
hitch to the big straw ropes, hundreds of feet in 
length. It is an exciting scene — beats a barbecue 
or an Irish wake by far. At the signal from a little 
man all give a terrific roar, and pulling for a mo- 
ment, abruptly stop to rest. One may imagine how 
much breath and time is wasted. 'Now and then a 
rope breaks and — a long swath of these promiscuous 



SEAFARERS ON LAND 83 

toilers is mowed down at one stroke, and again 
vociferous shouts rend the air. 

l^ow a peep at these seafarers on terra firma. 
When storms forbid them to launch out, they stroll 
the streets in droves, swinging leisurely along like 
prelates and from little pipes " drinking " tobacco, 
as thoy o^uaintly put it; and in blue checkered 
^^ni&uo^ with a big fish or a crane or the rising 
sun gaudily stamped in red on the back, they are 
surely a theatrical curiosity. But he can also busy 
himself at home. With the assistance of his tribal 
members, both large and small, he generally makes 
his own nets and lines, and all his rope — ^mainly of 
pounded rice straw. Living right on the spot with 
him is the wainwright and oar-maker, who repre- 
sents an immense army. His patterns are few and 
simple — often reduced to a single, uniform and time- 
honoured one. It is always the same three-cornered 
craft ; the tip of the stem end appears to have been 
sawed off. The prow forms a gradual long curve 
from the body of the boat and is very high. 

But though these dark-skinned adventurers 
have intervals of leisure, theirs is a life of great 
exposure. In the summer, in their scanty clothing 
(so often none at all) which betokens enviable 
comfort, they suffer little. But in the winter, with 



m FISHES AND FISHERMEN 

padded kimono drenclied to the skin, or else squat- 
ting in their sampans on high seas, with benumbed 
fingers operating a number of lines, fighting storms 
and adverse winds — all these create havoc upon their 
health. How ghostly these appear to the traveller 
on the coasting steamer ploughing through the 
seething waters ! 

Hark! What are these weird sounds falhtig,^? 
quick tempo upon the small hours of the morning? 
'^ Hi-ya, he, he, hi-ya I " Whole fleets of little boats, 
each manned by two or three fishers, come out of 
the rivers and inlets of the ocean, for but a moment, 
as it were, stealing over placid waters, only too soon 
to ride the whitecaps, bump against some frowning 
cliff or scrape a treacherous rock. But their minds 
are bent upon a harvest from the briny waters, and 
they ardently sing their funa-uta (sailor song), 
the object of which, of course, is to put energy into 
their work and keep time with their rowing. Ere 
the clang of a single temple bell could be heard, we 
have been roused morning after morning by these 
quaint and primitive strains of music, nearly a mile 
away. But already these men have performed the 
invariable duty, which amounts to almost a sacred 
ceremony, that of bidding farewell to wife and chil- 
dren, being not in the least assured of a safe return. 



SLIMY SEA-DEVILS 85 

Bays and coast waters are well stocked with fish 
and creeping things beyond number or knowledge, 
reminding one of Peter's vision. With the use of 
a glass-bottomed square box, the haunts of Mr. 
Octopus can be seen at a great depth, and with a 
three-pronged instrument fastened to a long bamboo 
these long-armed, slimy sea-devils are speared in 
great quantities. But for eating they are as tough 
as mochi and as indigestible as daihon. There are 
also countless numbers of cuttlefish and eels, as bone- 
less and slippery as a pedlar, armour-plated crabs 
and lobsters ; also tons of starfish are hauled on the 
sand beach to dry for fertilizer. Of sea urchins 
and starfishes alone there are thirty-eight species; 
and the number of species of fish inhabiting or 
invading Japanese waters is said to exceed six hun- 
dred. Leaning over the gunwale of the steamer, 
immense droves of sea birds can be seen in the 
clear depths below. 

Aside from their swimming feats, some of these 
intrepid brown men are marvellous divers. With 
basket in one hand, they plunge into the deep, and 
amid reefs and rocks, with a hammer pound off 
oysters and gigantic clams. We have also seen the 
women, for the sake of a daily livelihood, dive into 
the briny waters as readily as the men — ^snatching 



86 FISHES AND FISHERMEN 

an edible seaweed from the rocky caverns and poking 
it into a bag fastened to the neck. But our fisher 
friends also make for the great deep, where they 
waylay those whale-shaped, two- or three-hundred- 
pound dolphins and other big marine game, with 
which, amid laughter and frolicking, they return in 
the evening. With great haste they bring their 
catch in two-wheeled carts to the depot, whence 
many tons are daily shipped to the large cities. 
Afraid of missing the train, they come panting pell- 
mell down the zigzag streets, a long procession of 
half-clad men and pudgy women, some pulling, 
others pushing and all shouting at the top of their 
voices, '' Ho-o, ho-o, Jioya; Jio-o, hoya!" 

In some places trained cormorants are employed 
in fishing. This is always done by torchlight. 
These birds are caught when very young and 
utilized for fifteen or twenty years; one of them 
can catch as many as one hundred and fifty good- 
sized fish in a single hour. Whales are of course 
caught in other countries, but in Japan whaling 
furnishes the wildest of scenes. They are still 
caught by means of nets and harpoons, as well as 
with modern whaling boats. During the season we 
have seen four or ^ygs big monsters, from sixty to 
eighty feet in length, towed daily to a coast station 



" WHY DIRTY FACES? " 87 

where many men and more women employed in 
landing and cutting up the carcasses presented a 
horrid and most repulsive spectacle, and where the 
seashore was transformed into a mammoth slaughter- 
house. 

As may he expected of the poorest of any clime, 
the fishermen's dwellings, often a continuation of 
huts under one straw or tile roof, are crudely built 
of mud and sticks, resembling a beaver camp. 
Equally so, the entire town, as a rule, is an anti- 
quated ramshackle affair. Almost everywhere 
vermin can be seen — crawling, hopping or flying 
about. Though means of ablution are theirs in 
abundance, they evidently are not deemed a great 
necessity. Unless confronted by the policeman's 
frown or a chilly winter wind, the men usually 
evince their utter inability to comprehend any rea- 
son for clothing. The children, more numerous 
than among any other class, run about in happy 
I abandon, and when the tide is out, like crabs, turtles 
and octopus, play leap frog together. Being much 
of the time almost denuded of dress, sea bathing is 
the easiest thing in the world. Then wonder not at 
our frequent puzzling, " Why so many dirty faces ? " 
And those indescribable noses! A mission worker 
with frail stomach may wisely distribute sheets of 



88 FISHES AND FISHERMEN 

coarse rice paper (instead of kerchiefs) ere lie pro- 
ceeds to initiate his young auditors into the mys- 
teries of the Bible. Unsightly blotches of eczema 
are on many skulls ; the nose and other parts of the 
face are disfigured with boils and blisters as though 
the dear children had been smelling a rather hot 
flat iron. 

There being no chimney to the dwellings, the fire- 
place is a crude hearth, often but a trench, and the 
little hut becomes filled with stinging wood smoke, 
blackening and shining the rafters above with soot 
and damp, and escaping through door openings and 
dilapidated shojij the whole looking from the grey, 
featureless passages like a rat trap indeed. But 
here they live — ^with seemingly some degree of con- 
tentment, in a small space, on old brown-smoked 
mats, where they sleep and eat and keep their nets 
and tackle, and where from carbon dioxide con- 
stantly drenching the hut within, as well as from 
the open sewage without, vile and poisonous odours 
are emitted- 

Their daring recklessness makes these ocean 
hunters appear fatalistic. But, after all, none of 
them enjoy the thought of death. They are also 
very superstitious and afraid of ghosts. Lest some 
offence on their part should invoke the vengeance 



KIND-HEARTED FISHER FOLK 89 

of the sea god, they earnestly covet his benediction 
on their distant, trackless journeys. For many 
among their number are continually being buried 
in watery graves, howling winds having driven their 
frail sampans through nebulous fogs, upon the 
hidden, wrecking rocks. 

Though boisterous and rude, these fisher folk are 
also clever and kind-hearted. We never saw one 
do the least injury to a child, and having often 
visited these villages, generally found the people 
cheerful listeners. Though sadly ignorant and well- 
nigh incapable of comprehending the simplest of 
divine truths, yet some are grandly transformed by 
the power of the Gospel. 



IX 

'MID FLOWEES A:^D FOEESTS 

JAPAK — flower land, sunrise land, land of gay 
lanterns and bright kimonos, land of cherry 
and lotus and iris — thus she dwells in the 
thoughts of most of the world. But this is only one 
side of the picture. But come with us and you can 
be shown six months of solid winter, with mercury 
thermometers frozen hard and straw-topped villages 
entirely buried in snow; long, long stretches of 
rigorous, unsettled frontier; wild, jungle-like for- 
ests; bleak, barren hills and rugged, unexplored 
mountains ; here gay clothing and delicate manners 
are unknown and people often exist by strenuously 
fighting the wolf from the door. Forsake the city, 
turn from the beaten path, and you shall have a 
glimpse of real Japan. 

Nevertheless Japan is beautiful, and the state- 
ment that it is " the garden spot of the Orient " 
we would not contest. The Japanese flora affords 
over two thousand seven hundred and forty species 
of trees and plants which also have an exceptionally 

90 



MARVELLOUS CLIMATE 91 

large number of genera. Of trees alone there are 
over one hundred and sixty-eight species, only half 
of which number can be found throughout entire 
Europe. One cause for this marvel is the great 
variety of climate. On the other hand, the sturdy 
pine of the distant north flourishes beside the trop- 
ical bamboo. Here is a wheat field reminding one 
of the Dakotas (except in size), and the adjoining 
luxurious rice patch would equally be a credit to 
the Gulf States. 

Foreigners in Japan are struck with the com- 
parative scarcity of songsters in the forests; but 
there is no end whatever to flowers, both wild and 
cultivated. On some festival days one may see the 
country people hauling their flowers to the towns 
and cities in loads, like the American farmer does 
his cordwood. Though the native flowers of Japan 
may not be as fragrant as those of the West, per- 
haps due to the humidity of the climate, the Japa- 
nese show a far heartier appreciation of them. Im- 
mense quantities are used at funerals. Singularly 
beautiful are the large white and gold mountain 
lilies. We have seen whole hillsides covered with 
these emblems of purity ; they are much larger than 
our Easter lilies and delightfully fragrant. Dur- 
ing the summer the railway stations in some sec- 



9^ 'MID FLOWERS AND FORESTS 

tions are adorned with a floral display. Here al- 
most in groves are the oleander trees laden with 
their douhle light-pink or white blossoms; there 
along the line the traveller's eye is dazzled by the 
lovely giant daisy, which in almost tree-like size, 
with innumerable blossoms, is trained to hang over 
the ornamental stone walls ; or again one finds him- 
self bewitched by the aroma of roses in multi- 
colours and which often form entire hedges. A 
better adapted climate and soil for roses could 
hardly be found. 

Who has not heard or read of the glory of 
Japanese cherry blossoms or of the grandeur of the 
chrysanthemums ! Of the latter Ave saw in the 
back yard of an humble tailor over one hundred 
varieties; some plants bore both red and white 
flowers. At another place over one hundred and 
fifty varieties, daintily arranged, told of the almost 
magical skill, as well as superb taste, of these 
florists. Some of the flowers are like large snow- 
balls, petals all smooth and turned in one on top 
of the other. Others have long filaments sticking 
out like starfish, or again look like the towsled head 
of a poodle dog. 

The gay rhododendron shrubs adorn both palace 
courts and cottage yard; blooming sometimes in 



BEYOND ARTIST'S SKILL 93 

white, but more commonly in various shades of red 
and purple; also behind the farmer's grey hut, on 
the richly wooded, broken hills, slashed with ravines 
and waterfalls, and on up the steep mountain sides 
they grow wild in great profusion. There is the 
bamboo, fifty feet high, the growth of one season; 
and interspersed here and there various species of 
camellia, whose dark-green leaves and double rich 
red rosettes contrast gaily with the lighter shade 
of the bamboo. The latter, often adorning some 
garden nook, with its tassel-like tops abruptly cut 
off, is graceful and stately and resembles waving 
ostrich plumes. The camellia tree lavishly laden 
with blossoms, grows as profusely in different parts 
of the country as willows in the swamp, and wintry 
snow storms cannot mar their glory. In the month 
of January, when yet a stranger in this strange 
land and out in a lonely rural district, climbing a 
little boulder-strewn, pine-clad elevation, imagine 
my unspeakable joy to be royally greeted by daz- 
zling crimson camellia amid its glossy, dark-green 
foliage; untarnished mosses and ferns at my feet, 
and glancing beyond, a rippling azure sea studded 
with snow-white sails! The wintry aspect of the 
garden has magically disappeared by the continual 
bloom of rose and petunia. The loquat tree, which 



94 'MID FLOWERS AND FORESTS 

produces both beautiful and delicious fruit, in De- 
cember, is for weeks crowned with fragrant blos- 
soms, though the fruit does not mature until May. 

In parks and temple courts the purple and white 
wistaria also furnish a grand display. We have 
seen one vine, the favourite retreat of sullen-faced 
old monks, covering an arbour forty feet square, on 
the under side of which hung in profusion and in- 
describable splendour the purple racemes, some- 
times four feet long, till the whole looked like a 
waving mass of silken ribbons. But in springtime, 
nature, unaided, offers this priceless treat to the 
passerby from beautiful trailers which festoon the 
thickets of roadside and woodland. But space for- 
bids to more than mention the crape myrtle, the 
sweet-scented magnolia and mohusei (oleafragrans) ; 
the lotus which transform a slimy pond into a 
paradise; the iris — in various shades of blue, pur- 
ple, pink and yellow, as well as white; the great 
blue campanula; the beautiful hydrangea, which 
in the process of blooming are successively arrayed 
in light green, white, pink, purple and blue. 

But though nature itself is so enchanting, it 
becomes exceedingly so with the assistance of these 
skilful and scientific horticulturists, among whom 
even temple priests appear as rivals. But in the 



MILLENNIUM-OLD CEDARS 95 

parks, when seeking to imitate Western landscap- 
ing, their bungling is as conspicuous as their magic 
skill when following the native taste. Equally so, 
let no Western imitator be too sure of his achieve- 
ments in " things Japanese," lest he be chagrined 
like the wealthy American who, escorting his 
Japanese friend through the big garden, finally in 
some snug corner introduced him to what he thought 
was a triumph in pure Japanese landscaping. The 
guest raised his hands in delight. " Magnificent ! " 
he exclaimed, " there is nothing like it in all 
Japan ! " Once in our garden, we informed a 
Japanese gentleman of rare taste of our desire to 
have the gravelled walk bordered with choice flow- 
ers. Close by stood a rough, oblong stone pillar, 
beside which grew a slender shrub, and at its foot, 
on the bare brown soil, a tuft of coarse grass. Smil- 
ing contemptuously at our project and placing his 
little soft hand upon the rock, he patted it caress- 
ingly and said, " This is genuine beauty." 

Though millennium-old majestic cedars adorn 
many a mountain height, curiously enough Japa- 
nese art is no more in sympathy with the straight 
than the rectangular; rather gloating over gnarly 
and crooked pines, whose horizontally extending 
limbs resemble the arms of the octopus. Here is 



96 'MID FLOWERS AND FORESTS 

an idyll — a sound and perfect pine, though perhaps 
only twelve inches in height, and which has cheered 
some humble home for over fifty dreary winters. 
There are also plenty of dwarf peach, plum and 
other trees, whose slender limbs, thickly laden 
with blossoms, droop down along the knotty trunk 
like weeping willows. Sometimes they are fash- 
ioned to represent objects such as sailboats, pa- 
godas or fish. These dwarfs usually thrive in 
flower pots and decorate many of the otherwise un- 
inviting entrances of city dwellings. But to have 
little trees is not at all singular, where vehicles, 
railway trains, houses, tools, match boxes and al- 
most everything else, including the people, appear 
little to the foreigner. 

For months one can see the pomegranates' crim- 
son bloom; but my great expectation of this being 
one of the most delicious fruits, due to the fact 
that in the Bible it is associated with luscious figs, 
grapes, etc., in the early autumn was doomed to 
disappointment. The Japanese pear also, though 
looking like large russet apples, in taste has been- 
likened to sawdust and water. While not attempt- 
ing to describe the native fruits, mention must be 
made of one more — the persimmon — by far the best 
in Nippon. It is of different varieties, all much 



ART IN BOUQUETS 9T 

larger than those found in ]^orth America. Some 
are shaped like an acorn, others like the tomato. 
The varieties differ greatly in astringenc j ; some are 
uneatable before fully ripe, others while yet hard 
and green are devoured by the natives. A tree in 
full bearing loses all its leaves ere the first of l^o- 
vember, when the limbs are then simply weighted 
down with a wealth of golden balls. 

Bouquet-making, or the art of arranging flowers, 
called ihehana, is a veritable science and forms a 
part of a girl's education. It has been taught more 
or less in the flower schools since the sixteenth cen- 
tury. Pupils in the temples engage in these ex- 
quisite tasks under the supervision of the dexterous 
old priest. Though the instruction given by others 
is often for mere mercenary reasons, the priest — 
bent on the propagation of his cult — makes this a 
drawing card for the bashful young maidens with 
babies on their backs. Sitting on the mats, they 
gently and cautiously proceed with their painstak- 
ing task, selecting material from the little heaps 
of palm, lily and fern leaves, long-stemmed blos- 
soms and flowering branches. A crude vase and 
a pair of Japanese scissors are the other requisites. 
" In arranging flowers little attention is paid to 
contrasting colours, but linear effects, with some 



98 'MID FLOWERS AND FORESTS 

antique irregularities, are the artist's guiding prin- 
ciple. The way colours are massed together and 
at times stems, leaves and even petals brutally 
crushed in the West, seems barbaric to the Japanese. 
'No nation understands so well as they how to twist 
a spray of flowers or leaf into artistic line." There 
in that furnitureless, but clean little Japanese par- 
lour, in a corner alcove with slightly raised floor, 
in an elegant vase is seen a single pine bough, to- 
morrow a branch of flowering plum, later a solitary 
azalea or a peony-stalk, corolla and leaves — all dis- 
played in their perfect beauty. A little hanging 
vase on a polished post containing but a single iris 
or chrysanthemum, is another magic touch. The 
richness of this extreme beauty in solitude must be 
seen to be appreciated. 

But it is the artistic vase which in no small 
measure enhances the charm of this floral arrange- 
ment. Those famous, hand-painted cloisonne vases 
which require many months in making and cost 
fabulous sums, have excited our keenest interest. 
But expert workmanship and costly material are 
not the only factors which contribute such singular 
value to this art. When looking at a vase, the 
first thing that strikes one is not its material or 
finish — it is the pattern. We have watched the 




FASHIONING COSTLY VASES 



FANTASTIC VASES 99 

Japanese man with a slim purse, unable to buy 
cloisonne ware, finding a comparatively cheap vase 
answering every purpose. Do you know why ? Be- 
cause that simple and yet intricate pattern so nat- 
urally represents his aesthetic taste. An ear of 
yellow corn with green leaves for its base; an urn- 
shaDed woven basket; a fish; a cow's horn; a sake 
^ I „ a long-handled, wooden water bucket; a 
colossal lotus or morning glory ; all are wrought out 
in clay with appropriate colours. Vases made from 
short joints of gigantic bamboo sawed off squarely, 
with a temple scene or seacoast and storks carved 
on the glossy surface, though inexpensive, disclose 
the beauty of true simplicity. Innumerable and 
grotesque-shaped are the vases of iron, bronze and 
brass, many of which are numbered among cher- 
ished heirlooms. 

The flora of this Island Kingdom reveals a wealth 
of loveliness which, amid headlands and inlets, is 
vastly enhanced by the blue encircling sea. A veri- 
table paradox this is: a boundless panorama of 
gorgeous scenery, sufficient to entrance an angel's 
vision, but alas! Yonder idol shrines and temple 
towers, whose folly and shame the surrounding 
luxurious groves can never hide nor diminish, re- 
veal the very footprints of the Deceiver of man's 



100 'MID FLOWERS AND FORESTS 

soul. Again, though these outwardly Edenic as- 
pects would remind one of Isaiah's prophecy, " The 
desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose/' and 
though spiritually also this has been realized in 
part, it affords one a world of joy to reflect that 
God's never-failing promise shall be fulfilled to the 
uttermost. 



WAKING UP THE GODS 

IT was four o'clock one chilly morning in Jan- 
uary when a Japanese evangelist and a mis- 
sionary crossed the compound of a large tem- 
ple. The evangelist, formerly a Buddhist priest, 
had a very striking physiognomy, quite different 
from the ordinary Mongolian type; a hooked and 
peaked nose and heavy tattoo-like lines on the face, 
and a pair of keen eyes which well-nigh closed when 
he smiled. In reasoning he went to the heart of 
the suhject with the incisiveness and clarity of one 
splitting bamboo. 

Being yet pitch-dark but for the pale glimmer 
of a few lanterns, the two noticed a host of human 
forms at the rear end of the shrine of Ehisu, one 
of the gods of good luck, pounding on the board 
walls and vehemently calling some one within. 
" What's up here ? " said the missionary. " Trying 
to get in? Seems like a gang of coolies storming 
the contractor's dwelling for their wages ere he 
gives them the slip for another day." " 'Not that/' 
101 



102 WAKING UP THE GODS 

replied the evangelist ; " with wooden mauls they 
are waking up old Ehisu, whom they think very dull 
of hearing and still asleep." " But why so early ? " 
" Because these deluded multitudes believe that the 
first-comers obtain the richest blessings. Ah ! " he 
exclaimed, " if those fad-loving Americans who 
gloat over the beauties of Buddhism could only see 
that little else but sheer idolatry and superstition 
are associated with this hydra-headed monster." 

" Tell me, please, how does a scene like this im- 
press you now ? " the missionary queried. " I used 
to mumble vain prayers amid tapers and incense 
sticks, and I delighted to hear my own voice while 
simple souls with bowed heads tremblingly listened 
outside the screen. But now my heart sickens at 
the very thought, and but for divine help this subtle 
power would cause my faith to weaken and die, as 
carbonic acid gas quenches a flame in some musty 
mountain cavern. My soul loathes these temples. 
True, the lover of the aesthetic and the student of 
art and history haunt these places; also the con- 
noisseurs, who have almost denuded the country of 
curios during the last fifty years. But like all true 
soul lovers, I now only turn my eyes hither in pity. 
Christianity has not robbed me of my love for the 
beautiful. 



FABULOUS BEASTS 103 

" But after all/' he continued, " what of the im- 
pressive temple architecture, those tip-tilted turret 
roofs, gigantic carved doors swinging under the gate 
towers, the massive stone torii^ carved lions, dogs and 
foxes, that you have seen so often ; the fantastically 
arranged furniture ; the gaudy array of priests ; the 
mammoth circular hardwood pillars — richly lac- 
quered or gilded ; what of the gold-paper doors, the 
costly screens; rooms containing funeral tablets of 
great men — princes and even emperors; countless 
brass lanterns, drums and bells in the belfrys; 
prodigies of dragon and lotus fountains in the 
courts; cherry blossoms, wistaria arbours and au- 
tumnal maple tints, rippling streams and plunging 
cataracts; what of these embellished temples with 
coffers full of ancient treasures? What of it all? 
I value it only as dust compared to the untold worth 
of the teeming millions of my idolatrous, priest- 
ridden brothers." 

" A remarkable contrast, isn't there ? " inter- 
rupted the missionary. " I have been greatly im- 
pressed by these temples, new and old (one having 
cost over a million and a half dollars, I am told), 
which so often command most rapturous views from 
hill and mountain top, where they nestle beneath the 
shady domes of many a primeval pine — sturdy, old, 



104f WAKING UP THE GODS 

evergreen — far too splendid an emblem of the reli- 
gion propagated beneath them.'' 

" Yes, but when I think that these same hills and 
mountains are the very land that my fathers trod 
during the long weary watches of moral night ; that 
they wasted their sighing breath on the smoky old 
images of gods, from the highest divinities down 
to the lowest demons; that a passionate soul-thirst 
led them to exuberantly cast their hard-earned coins 
into the coffers of avaricious priests or fruitlessly 
contribute for the erection of countless and multi- 
form idols from the dwarf to the colossus; I say, 
when I think of this, for a time all natural beauty 
affects my senses not unlike the sight of a weeping 
willow grips an Occidental.'' 

The missionary stemmed this flow of eloquence 
by pointing to the stream of new arrivals. In haste 
they came as doves fly home to their dovecotes in 
a storm, and clustered around the chozu-hachi, a 
stone laver. " Here hands are washed, often with 
dirty water, and then wiped on strips of towelling 
generally shining with filth and dripping with dis- 
ease germs. Kindly explain what this all means." 
" Just an absurd rite of purification," the ex- 
priest answered. " And think of it, some would 



DEGRADING BUDDHISM 105 

unite Christianity with such a cult; but might as 
well talk the north wind down." 

"But is not this the strong hope of some of 
Japan's ablest and most sincere scholars ? " his com- 
panion chimed in. 

" Yes," he replied. " But they have tackled 
a project that bristles with insurmountable dif- 
ficulties, for fundamentally the difference is 
that between noontide and midnight; the one 
has the God, the other, gods. We Christian 
workers are taught to be girt and road-ready for 
the lowest mission to the fallen ; the Buddhist heart- 
lessly waits for the needy to come to him. Buddhism 
knows no sanctity for womanhood. Marriage of 
priests is totally unjustified by its ethics, and there- 
fore, although many priests do marry, they feel 
and acknowledge no obligation to make provision 
for the poor women whose chastity they have de- 
stroyed, and at their death may just leave them to 
the mercy of the elements. Does not the Chief 
Abbot of the greatest Buddhist temple in Japan, 
who is said to have fifteen wives and fifty-three chil- 
dren, demonstrate in a concrete form his ideal of 
home? Then I'll cite you a Lord Abbot, in intel- 
lect and station at the very head of this army of 
priests, who within one hour initiated over five 



106 WAKING UP THE GODS 

hundred believers into the ' holiness of Buddha ' by 
touching their heads with the tip of a long golden 
razor, making them spiritually shaven priests — a 
sure passport to Paradise — and who then went their 
way weeping for joy ! Can you imagine an atom of 
honesty in this high dignitary," the evangelist 
stoutly reasoned, " whose intelligence can but wit- 
ness to the fraud of such a proceeding ? " 

" But/' rejoined the missionary, " we must 
guard against undue criticism of even the Bud- 
dhist religion. Is it not a fact that here and there 
they have Sunday a.m. services, Sabbath schools, 
Y. W. and Y. M. C. A., seminaries for the training 
of itinerant evangelists, street preaching, tract dis- 
tribution, etc. ? " 

*' Yes, but this is mainly done on account of the 
realization that Christianity is steadily gaining 
ground, while they are playing a losing game. No, 
my friend, the best of Buddhism even is not worthy 
of a niche in the temple of our God." 

But as these two Christian warriors moved on 
in quest of their daily business, the missionary ex- 
pressed his utter amazement at the awful magnitude 
of this constellation of forty or fifty sects and sub- 
sects of Buddhism which so completely carried the 
field in bygone days. ^' Look," said he, " here is 



SICK HORSES AND PRIESTCRAFT 107 

temple after temple lining the entire street, and 
near one of our city missions alone there are at 
least five hundred temples." 

" Yes, but seldom is any one of these on friendly 
terms with the neighbouring shrine. While a tem- 
ple priest, and when in real usefulness I was not 
worth a handful of rice a day, it was within my 
province to act in deadly opposition to all the ad- 
joining temples and other sects, for whose priests 
we prescribed a thousand years in the lowest hell. 
We all acted on the ^ dog-in-the-manger ' principle, 
as you say in the West. Priest and people have 
forsaken their few ethical tenets, though ever so 
meagre; and the monks, who are given to increas- 
ing idleness on account of this decay, frequently 
rent the best parts of their quiet temples as summer 
residences, in order to defray current expenses." 

" The poor priests must be hard up for money," 
the missionary suggested ; " for a short time ago, 
when passing along the outskirts of town, I saw 
one in the veterinary business. The farmers had 
brought a number of sick horses, and the priest, 
dressed in his temple robes and standing near a 
stone god, had the horses led before him and lanced 
them on the neck." 

" IVe done a little of that in my day," the ex- 



108 WAKING UP THE GODS 

priest replied ; " but mind you, it is no veterinary 
treatment — pure priestcraft. The peasants, you 
know, are the right kind of material for these canny 
rogues to ply their trade on; and these which you 
have in mind simply desired the benefits of priest 
and horse god for their sick animals." 

" This reminds me," said the other, " of a story 
I once heard when visiting a mountain height con- 
cerning the weather god installed in a cave way up 
on the pinnacle. When the weather is not to the 
peasants' fancy, they temporarily suspend his au- 
thority, and rolling him out on the sod, give him a 
severe thrashing. Is it possible that the Japanese 
beat their gods ? " 

A look of derision was stamped on the evangel- 
ist's countenance; the corners of his thin lips 
twitched spasmodically, and with a sudden outburst 
he exclaimed, " Yes, and that is not all." Then 
with typical Oriental plainness of speech, he stated 
that a community of country people, because the 
rain god failed to answer their impassioned prayers, 
dragged him over the dusty country road. Still un- 
responsive, he was dipped into a W. C. and hung up, 
the peasants being quite sure that he would now pro- 
duce a copious shower in order to cleanse himself." 

Quickly suppressing an uncontrollable grin, the 



A PAST MASTER IN BLACK ARTS 109 

missionary said, " A far more militant community 
that than the people where I live, who in time of 
drought IVe often observed stacking their long- 
unused water wheels in front of the old shrine of 
this god, and meekly praying for rain. But no 
sooner does this deity pull a big cork from the burst- 
ing clouds than temple bells ring and the light- 
hearted peasants place thank-offerings before the 
shrine." 

Deeply engrossed in this interesting conversation, 
the two had halted in front of a temple which was 
by no means unfamiliar to the Japanese evangelist, 
and his countenance assumed a pained and pitying 
expression as one of his former colleagues, a Past 
Master in black arts, in vividly coloured and gold- 
embroidered surplice, proudly brushed past him 
with a cold and malignant look. " I am happier 
than he is by a thousand worlds," the evangelist 
said, while his eyes followed the monk to the temple 
where, accompanied by his satellites, he sailed mock- 
seriously about the altars, enchanting the ever- 
swelling multitude that jammed through the gates 
where the two Christian gentlemen stood. 

" Look here, what is this crowd really after ? " 
the missionary asked. 

" M'ah ! a needy lot they are, but think mostly of 



110 WAKING UP THE GODS 

temporal blessings," his partner replied. " They 
seek honour, health and wealth ; the father is trou- 
bled about his forlorn son, the wife about her 
drunken husband; the young woman is in search 
of a suitor, or the childless, silently longing and 
pining for the touch of little hands." 

" But I think it amazing," the missionary said, 
" that these bright and intelligent Japanese should 
suffer it to be told that they worship more idols 
than the Koreans or Chinese." 

" Sad indeed," the ex-priest articulated in a 
seeming strain of distress, " yet perhaps far worse 
than cold idols are our ancient traditions, covered 
by filmy glamour ; the hoary legends enshrouded in 
a sort of diabolical halo which create in the fond 
worshipper, except for God's supernatural power, 
an armour-plated resistance to Christianity." 

" Still truth will ultimately triumph," the mis- 
sionary repeated with infinite dignity. " I am not 
a prophet nor the son of a prophet, but as sure as 
the heyday of Buddhism is a thing of the past, I 
predict that the patient and generous seed-sowing 
of the gospel and the living influences of Christian 
civilization brought to bear on this generation as 
on no other, will result in an unthought-of and 
abundant harvest in the one to come." 



MOON-FACED PRIESTESSES 111 

The evangelist, however, remembering how in 
other days Christians in Japan attracted the stones 
and curses of unbelievers, and how to-day the un- 
favourable utterance of various pro-Buddhistic of- 
ficials are not merely harmless stage thunder, 
prudently remarked that Buddhism — Shintoism 
included, for that matter — ^had yet by no means 
capitulated; its towering bulwarks are gradually 
being undermined, though in the interior particu- 
larly, instead of actually tottering, in various places 
they are simply adamant. 

" Yes, ^ truth will ultimately triumph,' but 
mark my words, the field will not be ours without 
an obstinate and well-directed struggle," the evan- 
gelist said as he vigorously blew his nose into a 
sheet of rice paper which he drew from his kimono 
sleeve. 

Just then the missionary saw a bevy of moon- 
faced priestesses with shaven scalps issuing from 
a near-by temple gate, and for a moment their 
audacious inquisitiveness almost disconcerted him; 
but turning to his friend, he rejoined, " You have 
defined the situation very clearly; here is an un- 
paralleled opportunity: may the Japanese church 
rise to the occasion ! " 



XI 

" KENJUTSU " 

* ' AH, the Japanese delight in fighting," we heard 
/"% one of them say recently ; but indeed he 
scarcely divulged any secret. College and 
high school boys in hundreds and almost thousands 
may at times be seen with swords and guns out for 
military drill. But it is to be questioned whether 
these are ready to enter the actual fray as gleefully 
as their forefathers. Conscripts are often heard 
to speak deprecatingly of the military service, and 
schemes and tricks to exempt themselves from it 
are not uncommon. Parents whose sons were 
drafted for the late war are known to have not al- 
ways offered them gladly. 

The sword, as of old, is still playing a great role 
in the polity of this empire ; it forms part of the 
imperial regalia. This weapon also adorned the 
belts of the old samurai until the edict of 1876 abol- 
ished this custom, when precious metal in great 
quantities was heaped in the curio shops. Before 
that time, however, the samurai would just as soon 

112 



REVERING THE SWORD 113 

have surrendered life itself; for the sword was the 
badge of this aristocracy and the etiquette that regu- 
lated its wearing, though ever so trivially offended, 
was often the " cause of murderous brawls and 
dreadful reprisals. To touch another's weapon or 
to come into collision with the sheath was a dire of- 
fence, and to enter a friend's house without leaving 
the sword outside was a breach of friendship." A 
servant of the host brought it in and laid it upon 
a sword-rack in the place of honour near the guest, 
to be treated with all the politeness due to a visitor. 
But the bare hand of the most intimate friend dared 
not touch it; a silken napkin being kept for that 
purpose. 

Indeed Old Japan had also other weapons of war, 
such as the bow, crossbow, spear, lance, shield, 
broadaxe, halberd, bludgeon, roped hook, pitchfork, 
etc. Wrestling also was included in the military 
arts. The sword, in ancient days, was a straight, 
double-edged weapon three feet long and was bran- 
dished with both hands, differing from the modem 
one-edged sword, which is slightly curved toward the 
point. Some of these excelled the products of Da- 
mascus and Toledo, having been known to cleave 
piles of copper coins without even nicking the blade. 
As the trade of fancy basket-making has been per- 



114? " KENJUTSU " 

petuated in one family for generations, so also were 
certain families renowned for their marvellous skill 
as sword smiths. 

The samurai were originally the Mikado's sol- 
diers, but later, during the reign of feudalism, they 
constituted the warrior class, which until the res- 
toration lived in the castles of their daimyos. The 
two remaining classes of Japanese society were the 
nobility above and the common people below. By 
the samurai the profession of arms was considered a 
man's only sphere of exertion. Learning was often 
discarded and literary pursuits confined to monastic 
walls, and treated as a priestly luxury. !N"ever did 
they feel thoroughly interested except when con- 
versing on military affairs- — ^warriors were they to 
the backbone. 

Japanese history is replete with accounts of these 
chivalrous little men ; even mere lads were prodigies 
in this art. Often these would traverse the country, 
each one in quest of a worthy opponent, or new 
ideas to be added to his self-invented art. One of 
them, when but a youth, devised what was termed 
the two-sworded style, where the fencer, with a 
short sword in his left and a long one in his right 
hand, held them crossed to receive the blow. By 
a slight movement of the two weapons the defensive 



ANCIENT CHAMPIONS 115 

posture was assumed. For the opponent to break 
througli such a combination was a vain effort, but 
to withdraw would give the two-swordsman an easy 
chance to make a dart with his lower blade. This 
inventor drew knightly pupils from all over Japan, 
and for a long time no other fencer could cope with 
h^B skill. These champions, heading a host of ador- 
liig admirers, when defeated each in his turn, fell 
an easy prey to fits of murderous jealousy. For in 
duels, at times some modest youth, or grey-headed, 
shrivelled-looking, weak little man, would snatch the 
laurels from one of magnificent physique, and who 
had long been lionized by hosts of supporters as the 
first fencer in the country. Thus jealousy, murder 
and revenge followed one another in rapid succes- 
sion. These avengers swept the country far and 
near in search of their victim, and when they finally 
met, it did not mean a mere " knock-out," or a 
broken bone or scar; the sentiment of the Roman 
gladiator, " If I do not kill him, he will kill me," 
was here carried out to the letter. 

Indeed this warrior class had its code of morals ; 
they were chivalrous, and various incidents point 
out a large-hearted, magnanimous spirit; but their 
record as a race, if their own history must be be- 
lieved, is one of carnage and blood, as witnesses the 



116 " KENJUTSU " 

"Ear Mound " in Kyoto, where lie buried the ears 
and noses of thirty-nine thousand Chinese and 
Korean soldiers slain in 1598; or another mound 
north of Kyoto, which is a relic of a war of but 
a little later date, where the heads of forty thousand 
warriors were interred. But this time they were the 
skulls of their own brethren. 

Their character reveals not a li. Je of the In^a"^*. 
instinct. They have been known to carry a grudge 
in their bosoms from youth to age, and though, like 
bloodhounds scenting the track of the fugitive, these, 
when overtaking their victim, would go about their 
determined task with much ceremonious coolness. 
Men aforetime, as well as to-day, before despatching 
their victims have entertained them at a joyous 
feast. Is this a characteristic of this race only? 
Surely not; but if " treachery to friends is common 
enough in Japanese history," as the historian af- 
firms, what could we expect of their treatment of 
their foes? But no matter how blood-curdling 
might have been their plots against a foe, to go to 
the shrines and with clasped hands and head bent 
low invoke the aid of the gods was not an uncommon 
thing. 

In " Japan in Days of Yore," Mr. Dening speaks 
of one of those great fighters named Musashi, who 



A MURDEROUS PRAYER 117 

while with this motive approaching a temple, found 
another warrior with a loud voice and in a deeply 
earnest manner pouring forth his supplication as 
follows : " O thou all-powerful Tenjin, I am one 
whose occupation is fencing. But there exists a 
man called Musashi, whose skill in swordsmanship 
is superior to mine — ^him I cannot defeat ; neverthe- 
less, being the slayer of my adopted father, he is my 
mortal foe. I beseech thee to strengthen and teach 
me and to enable me to crush my foe." As he rose, 
imagine his astonishment to find himself confronted 
by this very Musashi, whom he at once recognized. 
Soon they were crossing swords, and one of the hot- 
test contests ensued. 

But Musashi, great swordsman though he was, 
met his match in an aged man with magnificent 
white hair and a pair of eyes that seemed capable 
of piercing one's being. In his younger days he 
won many a laurel, but on account of fierce jeal- 
ousies arising, retreated to a little mountain home. 
Here it came about that Musashi's proposal for a 
round at fencing was accepted by the old master, 
who entered the arena, however, without a sword. 
" Shall I fetch a sword ? '' Musashi asked. " l^o 
need of that,'' replied the old man, " anything will 
do; here is a pot lid, it will serve my purpose." 



118 « KENJTJTSU " 

This was a wooden lid, a foot in diameter, with a 
handle in the middle. Now Musashi had ever re- 
spected the aged, but now could scarcely conceal his 
contempt for such a weapon. Though the warrior 
with his two swords had in all combats carried the 
field, the old man warded off his blows like magic, 
and also delivered a sharp, back-handed stroke on 
Musashi's arm, which caused him to drop his sword. 
With the other sword, however, Musashi commenced 
slashing in fury at his opponent. But all his efforts 
proved futile, and the grandsire with his pot lid ad- 
ministered blow after blow, till conquered, the 
younger fell insensible. 

But Jcenjutsu (fencing), that time-honoured 
art and cherished inheritance from the samurai, is 
to-day cultivated among student classes; more or 
less among those in commercial ranks, and is said 
to be obligatory upon all police officers. The latter 
in many places participate in these performances 
once or twice a month. By the special invitation 
of the chief of police of a certain city, we attended 
these drills a few times. The instructors, who came 
from a distance, possessed a fine physique, and con- 
stant practice enables them to handle in succession 
as many as fifty sturdy little men. They have not 
only their daily appointments with different police 



FIERCE BATTLE OF POLICE 119 

forces, but at night are engaged with special classes. 
Besides the instructors, there are some notable 
champions among the pupils. At one end of the 
spacious hall, on a platform, were the chief official 
and a number of guests. At the other end, squatted 
on the mats, sat the participants, ready and waiting 
for their turn, or intently watching the combat in 
the arena below. All were clad in a sort of padded 
armour, covering shoulders and breast. The head 
was protected by a steel basket. E'ow with their 
wooden swords they advanced, and after a ceremoni- 
ous bow, began the contest. Imagine a combination 
of the prowess, speed and determination of the tiger, 
with the strength of a sturdy little ox, all focussed 
upon the opponent. 

With both hands they brandished their long 
wooden swords with agile and quick-motioned 
strokes which reminded one of the automatic ham- 
mers in boiler shops. The clash was simply fierce 
and made the more dreadful by their constant shrill 
shouts that rang like steel ; this to intimidate their 
antagonist. Once or twice there would be a little 
lull — they would retreat a few steps, then looking 
as fierce as the Ni-o — the giant guardians which 
stand at the entrance to Buddhist temples — the fight 
was renewed. Swift and fierce blows were dealt 



120 " KENJUTSU " 

out, and this, which seemed like a miniature Port 
Arthur, raised the question, " What must have been 
the real ! " When the exhausted pupil submitted 
to his fate and sued for quarter, like the old-time 
vanquished warrior, he bowed his head almost to 
the floor in feigned humility. One noteworthy sub- 
ject was the little thirteen-year-old son of a cham- 
pion. This boy made an astounding attack upon 
the instructor, and though little, his skill and wiry 
physique enabled him, when exhausted, to renew his 
tactics a number of times, until the honourable 
Chief was obliged to call him down. 

The late General E^ogi, in a speech given in 
Tokyo, stated that one travelling in the West finds 
Japan inferior in everything; that she has nothing 
to be proud of but her success in war. This per- 
haps need not be disputed, but it is nevertheless re- 
markable to what degree the military spirit of the 
entire race is evinced even among the smallest 
schoolboys, whose dexterity in handling a weapon, 
though but a bamboo pole, or wrestling in a sand 
pit, demonstrates the same courage and reckless con- 
tempt of life. 

Jvrjutsu, which in other days also composed part 
of the military education, is sufficiently known in 
the West to require no explanation. Just the rela- 



THE « SOFT ART " 121 

tion of a little personal experience at police head- 
quarters will suffice. The spacious hall floor was 
covered with thick Japanese mats, and the instructor 
in ju-jutsu came in for his honours. This practice 
is not obligatory upon students in the schools, but 
strictly so upon all police officers. There is a variety 
of over eighty different tricks embodied in this sort 
of wrestling, and it takes more than a mere mus- 
cular man to make himself proficient in this art. 
In Japanese it literally means " soft art," but does 
not appear altogether soft when one views the per- 
formance. In addition to the policemen, there were 
a considerable number of typical, raw-boned fisher- 
men, who coming from their seaside villages, though 
not regular pupils, kept one of the instructors re- 
markably busy for hours. 

Oh, the strength of endurance that was displayed 
even among the smallest of these little men! In 
the more advanced lessons in ju-jutsu, the instructor 
now and then finds it necessary to deal quite se- 
verely with his pupils. While the struggle proceeds 
and both are down on the floor in a seeming death- 
grip, he may artfully choke the other with his 
crossed hands drawing up his shirt collar. Should 
the subject surrender, no farther advances would be 
made; otherwise it has frequently occurred that 



122 " KEN JUTSU » 

these men were choked into insensibility, lying there 
without one pulse beat for five or ten minutes, pale 
and apparently lifeless. But the professional is al- 
ways supposed to do this without actually causing 
death. 

The event came to a close, and as we were asked 
to take a photo of those present, the crowd of iron- 
jointed little men afforded not a little spectacle as 
in the auditorium they fumbled around and strug- 
gled into their unaccustomed uniforms and boots, 
scattered amidst stacks of armour and swords. The 
friendly Chief, of fine physique — head and shoul- 
ders above most of his race — with a dignified air, 
facing us, asked : " What will you drink ? " '^ Wa- 
ter, sir," we answered. He thought we were jest- 
ing, and soon a waiter, dressed in a sort of blue 
jeans, served us with sparkling wine. A polite de- 
clining induced this regal son of Nippon to try an- 
other experiment. " Beer ! " he shouted, as though 
he had now discovered our real favourite, and with- 
out waiting for a reply, the humble servant, 
crouched on his knees, received the order to get a 
bottle of beer. Then we were pelted with all sorts 
of questions; some needed no direct answer, but 
others did, and among them was one put in sheer 



IMPROMPTU TEMPERANCE LECTURE 123 

disappointment, ^^ Why do you not drink beer 1 " 
Thus, while sipping a few thimble-like cupfuls of 
insipid tea, amid respectful listeners, in friendly 
converse, we were permitted to give an impromptu 
temperance lecture. 



XII 

BY LAND AND SEA 

A CCOMPAOTED by a fellow-countryman, we 
/"% chanced to board a train way out in an in- 
terior section, which still bore the undefaced 
marks of Old Nippon. As usual, the first thing we 
observed was the little baby cars — freight cars espe- 
cially, reminding us of the account in the paper of 
almost an entire train being blown off a bridge into 
the river. The strength of the wind could be guessed 
by the size of the cars. Ours was a narrow-gauge 
line and wound like a snake trail among the hills 
and valleys, naturally not advancing very rapidly. 
Our companion, being fleet of foot, furnished not a 
little mirth to the passengers by jumping off a few 
times and trotting along for mere exercise. 

A little earlier, when the morning sun had just 
kissed these thousands of islands, we saw a young 
man basking in the glory of the sunrise, and with 
clasped hands standing on the cramped car plat- 
form, offering prayer to the gods. But character- 
istic of Japan's variable weather, soon the heavens 

124 



STAMPEDING THE TRAIN 125 

began to wear a tired, overworked look, and here 
and yonder rain clouds chased themselves and, 
bumping into each other, occasionally slopped over 
into showers. Dragging into one little country sta- 
tion after another, whole platoons of simple-hearted 
farmers in grotesque garb and clumsy geta, in fear 
of not getting a seat, rushed with painful haste 
along the gravelled platforms. " But look," we 
remarked, " where are yonder people headed for ? " 
There, in backwoods fashion, along the narrow paths 
of the little rice ponds, came in tandem, droves of 
belated men, women and children, panting helter- 
skelter toward the train. A third-class ticket be- 
tween their teeth, umbrellas and bundles in their 
hands, and with more bundles the size of two or 
three bushel baskets strapped on their backs, we 
saw them cram into the little cars. 

" Shame on them, shame on them ! " we involun- 
tarily uttered; for strong man after strong man 
thrust back women and children, who were merci- 
lessly left standing in the rain, and had to consider 
it a favour to at last find a standing place in 
the two-foot aisle. At the consecutive stations some 
of the passengers alighted, but many more entered. 
Now it was a bevy of schoolgirls ; again a drove of 
fishermen with heavy boxes carried by means of 



126 BY LAND AND SEA 

shoulder poles — bringing them all into the car. But 
whoever wore Japanese kimono, the women had 
theirs drawn up to their knees and the men almost 
to the loins, with amazing indifference. At the 
more principal stations, little bandy-legged fellows 
in short pants and with caps of gaudy colours, yelled 
out their wares. Tobacco, newspapers, tea — scald- 
ing hot and sold in earthen pots with tiny cups ; hot 
milk in bottles ; all sorts of beer, sake^ lemonade and 
other drinks ; also hento — Japanese lunch, good, bad 
and indifferent, put up in little thin cedar boxes 
with a pair of chopsticks stuck in the string. 

Some of those water lovers, who had travelled 
guite a distance, hurriedly flocked out of the cars 
and availed themselves of the benefits of the lava- 
tories which are found at a few stations. Water 
splashed over their faces and wiped with a flimsy 
towel jerked from their ohi, like gophers they 
dashed back into the little car openings. When the 
little whistle of the engine screeches out the start- 
ing signal, all must be on board, and although anx- 
ious passengers have at that moment arrived at the 
gate with tickets secured, instead of being assisted 
aboard, they may just stand and with open mouths 
look dejectedly after the departing train. 

In a near-by shed a gang of coolies were handling 



GROTESQUE SCENES 127 

freight. Like vacuum sweepers, they inhaled fear- 
ful amounts of dust, for while in the process of 
lifting their burdens, all yelled in unison, " YaJien- 
yato — yahen-ya," in about the same key as the bray 
of a donkey. But what was also interesting about 
these dwarf-like creatures were the large hiero- 
glyphics which each wore on the back of his o&^-tied 
frock, and which a stranger might easily mistake 
for the insignia of a football or cycle club. About 
this time the interior of the car attracted our at- 
tention. Eluids were being gulped from teacups 
and bottles, and lumps of rice bolted down in magic 
haste. Some smoked, jested or snoozed; for the 
time being very comfortable, all but the bent-over 
forms of some standing women. 

Purposely we were riding third-class, though 
there are also second- and first-class cars. We ob- 
served some foreign-dressed gentlemen boarding the 
second-class car; however, two or three men in 
Western clothes came crowding into our compart- 
ment. One had his socks drawn up over his 
trousers and his cuffs fastened with strings instead 
of buttons; another one's tie was snugly secured 
around his neck under an erstwhile white collar 
whose unfastened ends rubbed against some stray 
bristles on his chin. 



128 BY LAND AND SEA 

But the " bumpety-bumpety " train lulled quite 
a number into fly-catching, jaw-hanging slumber. 
One lying on a bench, had his feet stuck out of the 
window; another one had his nose up against his 
neighbour's bare toes; another, perched on the seat 
like a fowl on the roost, was certainly an acrobat, 
for though continually nodding, he ever escaped 
toppling on the dirty floor. " Look here," said my 
friend, " one just wonders whether or not Western 
civilization is here but little more than a veneer. 
Splendid improvements are visible in and near the 
cities and in some smaller towns, but while trav- 
elling through these rural districts we seem to find 
comparatively little else but * Old Japan.' There 
are the thrifty rice fields, though just what they 
were hundreds of years back; but yonder also, on 
those bald hills and barren slopes, are the almost 
omnipresent and untidy straw huts, with all their 
implied misery and squalor." " True," said L 
^' But we ought not forget that elsewhere in 
Japan's interior, though yet ever so old-fashioned, 
there are remarkable signs of thrift and a gradual 
change for the better." 

By and by we neared the city of Tokyo, and we 
had a number of occasions to call our friend's at- 
tention to really praiseworthy improvements. But 



EPISODE IN RAILWAY STATION 129 

he always rewarded us with just a sort of chilly 
^^ M-hm.'' Upon arriving at the capital, we were 
speedily bowled away in 'rikishas to another sta- 
tion. While waiting in the first-class room, where 
a promiscuous crowd, some arrayed in gorgeous 
silken kimonos, others in Western garb, were seated 
on upholstered sofas, in came a string of red-capped 
porters one after another, with camel-loads of par- 
cels and even small trunks, and stacked as many as 
possible on the centre table. One of those " red- 
caps," headed by a gentleman in a dashing foreign 
suit, brought a steamer trunk on his back and 
satchels in his hand. The gentleman took off his 
coat. " The heat is certainly not so oppressive," 
one thought. E'ext came off his waistcoat, then his 
collar and tie and dress shirt even, and about this 
time our party began to blush with shame, par- 
ticularly on account of the ladies present. But 
consternation seized us when this dandy divested 
himself of trousers also and stood there complacently 
in a suit of red underwear. He then carefully 
folded his garments, leisurely placed them in his 
trunk and donned his native attire. "Did no 
scathing denunciations fall from the flower lips of 
those young women ? " you ask. 'No ! They not 
even blushed or frowned. ^Nobody was worried but 



130 BY LAND AND SEA 

ourselves. As to our travelling companion, he 
chuckled triumphantly, saying, " Aha, there's your 
civilization ! " 

This central depot was dotted and packed with 
human figures; here and there stood a keen-eyed 
policeman, who resembled the one we met on the 
train with a pack of criminals dressed in copperas- 
coloured garments and with big reed-woven baskets 
slipped over their heads and faces. This headgear 
is intended to save them unnecessary mortification 
should they chance to meet with some acquaintance. 
Some were securely handcuffed, while others only 
tied with a light rope which the police as invariably 
carry in their pockets as the sword by their sides. 
We inquired of one of these officers concerning this 
great concourse of people, whether anything un- 
usual was in the air, and whence they were going. 
" Many of these have only come to ' see off ' or 
^ welcome ' their friends or distinguished visitors," 
said he, " and," pointing to some slot machines, 
" from those one can get his platform ticket for a 
-Q-ve-sen piece." Directly we were confronted by 
another officer, who was evidently desirous to show 
his proficiency in foreign languages. ^' Gehen Sie 
back ? " rang in our ears as clear as the click of a 
musket. He had obviously gotten a little mixed up 



EMPEROR RIDING IN OX-CART 131 

when picking his nuggets from conversation books. 

But the journeying public of Japan is an im- 
mense army. Travelling being comparatively 
cheap and home cares few, the common as well as 
the higher classes, in whose veins runs the blood of 
the old roving pilgrims, will board the trains on the 
,( lightest excuse. On the main line (a broad-gauge) 
run splendid, commodious express trains, dining 
cars and sleepers. " In place of ^ man-pull-cars ' 
Pullman cars," one wi'iter worded it; still from an 
American viewpoint there is yet much room for 
improvement. 

" This vast concourse of kindly-faced Japanese 
must certainly know and thankfully remember from 
whence all these rich benefits came," we remarked. 
^' Think how the lords and princes had to travel in 
other days; and the late Emperor, when removing 
from Kyoto to the present capital, journeyed in the 
Imperial ox wagon drawn by two beasts single file." 
" Yes," replied our friend, " I am familiar with all 
this, but I know also that the present schoolbooks, 
when lauding the grand progress of Japan, do not 
as much as hint at the glaring fact that all this is 
theirs as a virtual gift from the West." ^^ Well," 
we rejoined, '^ we have knowledge of at least one 
man, a managing director of an electric railway 



13a BY LAND AND SEA 

company, who when addressing a number of busi- 
ness men, pointed out that the cars on which the 
visitors rode were of American construction, all the 
apparatus of American make; so were the rails, 
girders, pumps, condensers and generators. The 
whole system was designed, constructed and op- 
erated by a graduate of Stanford and Purdue xJai- 
versities. The director also mentioned that At? 
president of the company, as well as himself, were 
American students.'' " Splendid acknowledgment,'' 
was the reply, " but I hope they'll be as generous 
when American visitors are not present." 

Suddenly our friend whispered, " Look there ! " 
Eight behind us in the throng I saw a sight which, 
though regrettable, exhibited a Japanese trait pure 
and simple. Occidentals when in a brawl are usu- 
ally noisy, but these people can quarrel under cover. 
All we could see was an elderly woman with a 
stolid gaze looking intently upon a young girl still 
in her teens. But like a flash the old dame applied 
a few fists full of ginger on the poor girl's back. 
Another motion, a grunt — and all was at an end, 
as far as we could discern. 

Cheerful sunlight again streamed through the 
rifted clouds. A large company of frolicking pic- 
nickers with their saTce gourds and supplies of 




THE STURDY VEGETABLE TEDLAR 




CHILDREN MAKING MATCH BOXES 



ONE OF JAPAN'S PARADOXES 133 

lunch, boarded the train for the near-by seashore. 
As innocent as these saA:e-drinking holiday makers 
have usually been described, yet at many of these 
outings the indecent language indulged in and the 
disgusting postures displayed by some of these rev- 
ellers, must unmistakably have the vilest effects on 
the many children present. The train sped on past 
one village after another. At one hamlet, roadsides 
and commons covered with oiled paper umbrellas 
stuck up in the sun to dry, were among the many 
curious sights that arrested our attention. At a few 
other places there lay on mats many heaps of little 
match boxes — the uniform size being only two 
inches long. Groups of little girls, scarcely more 
than babies, pasting together these tiny boxes, sug- 
gests one reason why matches here are such a cheap 
commodity. 

For quite a distance the track skirted the ocean, 
and as an unfavourable wind wafted insufferable 
odours through our windows, we turned and saw 
the sandy beach covered with sardines spread out 
to dry. Enchanting scenes and stifling smells — one 
of Japan's paradoxes ! Farther on in the lowlands, 
on a perfectly level stretch of hundreds of acres, we 
noted the process of salt-making by evaporating sea 
water, which comes and recedes with the tide. 



134j by land and SEA 

These and all other salt manufactories in the Em- 
pire constitute a government monopoly, which fact 
was brought forcibly to mind when a small package 
ordered from America was confiscated by the cus- 
toms officers. Eor convenience' sake we left Tokyo 
by second class. Toward evening we reached a town 
renowned for its famous temples, and as the train 
glided past, many among the motley host of pas- 
sengers in that fearfully crowded, gloomy and suf- 
focating car, dropped their cigarettes and tiny pipes 
and, standing, clapped their hands and made sancti- 
monious bows toward the shrines. 

" Have we to spend six or seven hours to-night 
in a car like this ? " our comrade nervously in- 
quired. Of course he was annoyed, and why should 
he not be? The disorder was something shocking. 
The unmannerly passengers, some wearing large 
caped mackintoshes over their kimonos, occupied 
space enough for three. The seats were used as a 
sofa, and bags and baskets were arranged at both 
ends as a barricade, while those who boarded the 
train later were forced to hang on the edge of a 
seat or even stand. Though long delayed, the hum- 
ble request of the porter at last compelled some of 
these " train hogs " to reluctantly relinquish a little 
of their space. These people, accustomed to sleep 



HARD BENCHES VERSUS FLEAS 135 

in hermetically sealed houses, could not abide an 
open window even on that balmy spring night. 

" Four hours more — I cannot endure this hell of 
nicotine/' our friend remarked as his watch case 
snapped once more. " Let's take a sleeper, then," 
we replied. But alas! The sleeping car proved 
no exception to the others. More air-tight windows, 
more clouds of tobacco smoke, for which the women 
as well as the men were responsible. When the little 
train guards finally called out our station, with 
swimming heads and stifled breath we finally tum- 
bled down the platform steps. 

At this stage of the journey we took leave of our 
travelling companion and repaired to the near-by 
wharf of a steamboat company. " Don't sit on 
those mail sacks," a petty official imperatively 
shrieked at one of a bunch of simple countrymen 
who were sleepily staggering about. Curiosity led 
us to discover that imperial mail sacks, no matter 
how old and dirty, are not to be desecrated thus by 
any common mortal. For us it was left to decide 
between a combat with fleas in an adjacent hotel 
and a hard bench in the waiting room. Suddenly 
we were espied by some young student, who with 
an ingratiating smile preyed upon us with the uni- 
versal request for a little English. We greatly ad- 



136 BY LAND AND SEA 

mired his persistence, though weariness of the flesh 
forced us to politely decline. 

It was about two o'clock. The bench seemed so 
hard. But we managed to snatch a little sleep from 
the tedious hours. Of a sudden a terrific clatter 
of many geta sounded through the halls below. 
iNTearer it came, and as about forty pair of wooden 
clogs ascended the big stairway, thundering vibra- 
tions increasingly broke upon our ears. In a second 
of time we were sitting bolt upright on the bench, 
and lo, there confronted us a throng of smiling 
young lassies from a Girls' School, who with their 
teacher had come by steamer from their peaceful 
island homes to take a holiday trip to a few of 
Japan's Meccas, such as Kyoto, ISTara and Ise. 
These young ladies greatly provoked the porter by 
stamping on and thus damaging the nice linoleum 
floor with their destructive footwear. But being 
" green " — from the interior, their simple innocent 
manners invited from all present the broadest of 
tolerance. 

As there were in this waiting room but a few 
benches, most of these youthful travellers remained 
standing, staring at one another. But all of a sud- 
den, unbidden and without ceremony, they quietly 
but carefully began to make their toilet. " Must 



« PHALANX OF NIGHT RIDERS " 137 

we then sue for quarter ? " was our thought. For 
amid the glitter of tiny mirrors, the brandishing of 
quaint and crude wooden combs and the flutter of 
long, shiny black tresses, one felt exceedingly out 
of place. But this strange and unexpected phalanx 
of " night riders " made our escape impossible. 

Later on, toward dawn of day, just as though the 
teacher had, general-like, given orders, toothbrushes 
came into play, and sashes and upper garments 
were adjusted. Amid the low murmur of feminine 
chatter, excessive and repugnant snuffling revealed 
the entire absence of handkerchiefs. " 0-cha, 
o-chaf (honourable tea) they all shouted like 
candy-loving children as a monstrous big teapot, al- 
most too bulky for one little red-cheeked lassie, ap- 
peared. She poured the exhilarating fluid into 
diminutive cups, which were then served to the 
entire company. Hurriedly each student, with the 
assistance of chopsticks, annihilated a neatly-packed 
lunch, consisting of thick rolls of rice wrapped in 
edible black seaweed. This done, marching orders 
were given. Each with a travelling bag slung over 
her shoulder, with hoof -like sounds they again thun- 
deringly descended the steep stairway, and in a 
platoon disappeared. 



XIII 
A PAEADISE OF ISLES 

WHEN steaming out of Osaka Bay, the 
island of Awaji lies in the forefront of 
the eastern gateway to the famous Inland 
Sea, and is the dividing point of two waterways; 
to the left usually ply the hig ocean liners, while 
the passage to the right is followed by larger and 
smaller coasting steamers. On one of these, in the 
autumnal moonlight, we embarked one evening. 
Gazing over the tranquil ocean surface, we now and 
then caught a faint glimpse of a distant island. It 
was about here where in 1850 Commodore Perry's 
black man-of-war made its appearance, and the 
grandfather of one of our Japanese friends made 
a fancy sketch in ink of this strange monster which 
attracted the frightened natives in droves to the 
near-by seashore. 

As WG ploughed on we soon reached an area 
where sea and land seem still in conflict for su- 
premacy. Anticipating this, we did not close our 
cabin doors, and like rabbits slept with one eye 

138 



FLOODS OF GLORY 139 

open. At dawn, sih, what a marvel! Here and 
everywhere, trying the pilot's utmost skill, lay 
quaintly shaped, tiny islets and islands, some bleak 
and barren, others with only a few gnarly pines, 
like sentinels, lining their ridges. When the ruby, 
fiery orb of morning, in all his splendour, flashed 
upon an azure sea, with islands studding the whole 
like so many molehills on a meadow, floods of glory 
also broke upon the grey villages pasted up against 
the steep hillsides of the larger islands and the 
poetry-encircled headlands whose outer pinnacles 
and cliffs were almost invariably crowned with 
some lonely, primitive shrine or temple. Stone-built 
quays, dividing prominent inlets into little har- 
bours, extended to groups of grey, bleak rocks " not 
made with hands." 

Now coasting for a short time along the main- 
land, hundreds of scattered villages of low-roofed 
huts, straggling from the water's edge halfway up 
the mountain sides, peacefully basked in the morn- 
ing light. In the terraced fields, mere garden spots, 
hundreds of feet above us, phantom-like beings 
with a bit of white around their heads could be 
seen moving about, adding vivacity to this mys- 
terious creation. Among the islands again; these, 
however, for a time much larger and with moun- 



140 A PARADISE OF ISLES 

tains of higher altitude, and on account of 
rising almost perpendicularly out of the sea, more 
majestic-looking. They towered up out of the 
placid, dark blue waters, dotted with schooners and 
fishing smacks, which with flapping sails dragged 
lazily along, till on that calm and balmy morning 
it seemed as though one were gazing on miniature 
Alps from Lake Geneva. 

In places the sea is unusually shallow, and our 
rather large steamer with gTeat caution slowly ad- 
vanced. Just at this time the tide is very low, and 
the otherwise submerged reefs and islets are a visible 
bare sand beach, on which fisherwomen and chil- 
dren, who have ferried across on little flat boats, dig 
out the sea clams for a meagre livelihood. 

At the port of Onomichi, huts of fisher folk, with 
big nets strung up by pulleys, line the water's edge. 
Farther on there is a large Oriental fish market. 
On the road above, crowds of pedestrians and jin- 
rikishas move along toward the railroad yet higher 
up, eagerly waiting to reverently greet the Em- 
peror's special. Looking still higher, there stand 
the stately old temples and pagodas as though seek- 
ing the friendship of the precipitous, boulder-cov- 
ered mountain sides and sky-piercing spires. On the 
same elevation are clusters of other shrines and 



A BUSTLING PANORAMA 141 

temples and bell towers, surrounded by groves of 
evergreen and maple. To this sacred height leads 
a continuous flight of stone stairs that wind past 
quiet villas and peach and plum groves. 

That a thriving commerce is carried on in this 
section is indicated by the numberless burden- 
fraught sampans and other craft gliding to and fro ; 
carts drawn by coolies yelling " Ho hui ya, ho hui 
ya,'' as they feel their way through the crowded 
passages, and the men and women carrying goods 
from the steamers by means of a pole across their 
shoulders. Our vessel had barely stopped when 
fruit and newspaper vendors came climbing as clev- 
erly as monkeys over the gunwale, and little sam- 
pans laden with many kinds of fruit, persimmons, 
apples, pears, grapes, oranges etc., drew up within 
our reach. 

About here, slopes and hillocks yield splendid 
harvests of sweet potatoes, and this section is also 
famous for the variety of large and delicious per- 
simmons it produces. The reader must still im- 
agine himself surrounded by an Eden of islets and 
islands of all shapes and sizes. None but expert 
pilots can safely follow these aquatic trails through 
such a labyrinth. Upon entering the fortified zone, 
instructions are given not to do any photographing ; 



142 A PAHADISE OF ISLES 

but after all, were the eneray ever so well supplied 
with maps and topographical information, the idea 
of one cruiser chasing another would simply mean 
a smart game of ^' hide-and-seek." In such waters 
Japans many little torpedo boats come into good 
play; but conquering an enemy would add little 
glory to her flag, when considering the natural bar- 
rier this wilderness of islands furnishes to a hostile 
fleet. 

Our steamer, feeling its way as it advances, must 
needs turn successively toward all the points of the 
compass and pass through a narrow cut of scenic 
landscape. Large volumes of coal smoke heaving 
in sight indicate that we are nearing the Kure naval 
yards. Thousands of workmen inhabit the hut- 
covered hills. In this notable bay lie anchored some 
war hounds ; one of them quite near, the Popeda, is 
a trophy from the late war with Eussia. Close by 
is the arsenal. These powder magazines are con- 
structed under natural, solid rock-bound and rock- 
crowned islands. Here a wireless station, there 
frowning forts, and yonder, the ISTaval School of 
Etajima. 

Sampans crossing from island to island carry 
cows and ponies; and old men and women, young 
men and maidens — all alike show their skill in 



" NAPOLEON'S HAT " 143 

handling the old-fashioned Japanese paddle. E'ext, 
passing here and there steep, pyramidal mountain 
tops rising abruptly out of the sea, we run into 
Hiroshima Bay. It was from this place that many 
of the soldiers, en route to the war with Russia, took 
passage. Here also^ on the near-by islands, were the 
camps of thousands of Russian captives. While pro- 
ceeding toward the loveliest of scenic spots of all 
the Inland Sea, Miyajima (described in the next 
chapter), we passed a large island, the shape of 
which — a mere steep mountain — our French com- 
panion in travel quaintly designated " Napoleon's 
hat." In the last moments of the setting sun, above 
the jasper-coloured ocean mirror, east, west, north 
and south, the mountain chains were shrouded in a 
light-blue haze, and far above it still, soft tints of 
pink and purple bespangled the entire firmament. 



XIV ^ 

E]SrCHA:tTTI]^G MIYAJIMA 

MIYAJIMA is not blest with majestic 'Ni- 
agaras, nor adorned with the sublimity 
of Alpine Mountains. It is a rather small 
but nevertheless very beautiful place, so much so 
that the Japanese consider it one of the three grand- 
est sights of the Empire. But to fully appreciate 
its good points one should reckon with their sesthetic 
taste. Among many, it is just one small mountain- 
ous island, thickly wooded with evergreen. Legend 
and history hover around this spot like butterflies 
amid sunshine and flowers. Besides the priests, 
idol-carvers and innkeepers, as well as the fishermen 
whose huts nestle beneath these groves of maple, vast 
multitudes of pilgrims and pleasure seekers make 
long journeys to reach this celebrated site. 

Several emperors, as well as renowned shoguns 
and great daimyos of other days travelling in lac- 
quered ox wagons drawn tandem by two burly 
beasts, escorted by servants, bearers of musical in- 

144 



BIRTHS AND DEATHS FORBIDDEN 145 

struments and other adjuncts in keeping with the 
days before the bustling West biunped in, selected 
this shrine at which to pay their homage to the gods. 
Formerly births and deaths were religiously for- 
bidden here. Even now, in the case of a sudden 
birth, the mother is asked to absent herself from the 
island for a month. Corpses also are invariably 
taken to some point on the mainland for burial. 
Here are no howling dogs nor rattling jinrikishas. 
It is perhaps the only place in Japan which in 
these days of political and commercial hustling still 
manages to retain something of the peaceful at- 
mosphere of the old regime, in spite of the occa- 
sional visits of ugly torpedo boats and other un- 
handsome murder machines that plough through 
these placid waters. 

We had barely landed and finished supper at a 
Japanese hotel — an electrically lighted, three-story 
building surrounding an open square filled with 
miniature mountains, dwarf trees and fountains — 
when we hastened out into the narrow but crowded 
and busy main street. The first thing that met our 
gaze was a brilliantly lighted excursion steamer ly- 
ing at anchor, which just a few minutes before had 
arrived, having brought a party of about eighty 
American visitors down through the Inland Sea, 



146 ENCHANTING MIYAJIMA 

who now briskly advanced through these curious, 
bazaar-like thoroughfares. We counted it a great 
privilege to meet and mingle with our country- 
men. 

The next morning we were abroad before day- 
light — our object being to take a little observation 
of the movements of the Shinto priests and votaries 
of this famous centre of the cult. Feeling our way 
through the narrow, crooked passages, we ascended 
and descended flights of century-worn stone steps in 
the dark, toward the place whence came the plaintive 
notes of a flute played by a priest in adoration of 
the patron god Kiyomori and the spirits of all other 
ancient sires. Mind you, Shintoism differs from 
Buddhism, in that it is not an imported reli- 
gion. It is simply the worship of ancestors; but 
the Japanese, without the least compunction of 
conscience, may embrace the deities of both 
faiths. 

One of these shrines, Itsukushima, whose main 
structure, wings, porches and long, deep-roofed cor- 
ridors cover a large area on the seashore, is built 
out over the water on piles. In the dimly lit halls 
some few devoted worshippers reverently knelt with 
their heads almost to the floor, and the hush of the 
twilight was only broken by their repeated hand- 



DOOM OF THE SACRED HORSE 147 

clapping. Directly, however, a man in his geta 
changed the order of things. Whether he meant to 
walk on his tiptoes down through the plank-floored 
corridors, we could not quite distinguish in the dark, 
but his gait was martial and the noise thunderous ; 
as he passed, he politely greeted us with '' O-hayo " 
— " It is honourably early." 

Ere the sun flashed through the vistas of green 
mountains round about, we were busy taking photos 
— among the first being the famous vermilion-col- 
oured iorii. It stands a good distance out in the 
sea, approachable, however, at low tide. This great 
unique structure is unlike all other iorii in Japan 
in that its two vertical pillars (of gum wood) are 
each supported by two more. Just outside the court 
of this shrine, in whose aquatic muddy bottom a 
number of cranes were strutting about, in a red- 
painted stable is a sacred grey horse. Often these 
animals are literally but skin and bone, " every rib 
being visible as they move abou. their confined 
sheds, hungrily watching for the mouthful of beans 
occasionally purchased by the charitable pilgrim." 
A more wretched position for an animal of such 
naturally active habits can hardly be imagined. 
These may be steeds of army generals whom they 
erstwhile carried through eventful campaigns, but 



148 ENCHANTING MIYAJIMA 

who, before their decease, now offer them to some 
renowned temple with a view of giving the horse an 
honoured repose in his declining years. 

iNot far away stands a quaint monument — a relic 
of the Russian war, looking like the hull of a steam 
boiler, but which really was the casing of a mast on 
the enemy's man-of-war, full of rents and holes 
caused by bombshells. Right c ' 7 is anot' c 
trophy — a cannon captured from the Russians, 
which was officially installed here before the coun- 
try's gods, with the object, doubtless, of intensifying 
national glory in the popular mind. All around 
the road that forms a semicircle along the beach 
stand a row of uniform-sized Japanese stone lan- 
terns. From under the heavy beams of an ancient 
gate leading to a shrine hangs a big circular lantern 
about ^ve feet in diameter. Another immense 
shrine is " The hall of a thousand mats." This 
structure, about 80 xl50 feet in dimension, is said 
to have seen hoary centuries. It is now ghostly in 
appearance and decaying, but its tile-covered roof 
is of enormous weight, due to the trusses that are 
formed by frames of heavy beams, being built one 
upon another in diminishing squares up to the ridge- 
pole. But its former glory is no more: near the 
centre stands a miserable and neglected altar — ^the 



BEWITCHING BAZAARS 149 

whole a veritable " habitation of dragons and a court 
for owls." 

Near-by is also a five-hundred-year-old, tall and 
impressive-looking pagoda. From an architectural 
standpoint it must at one time have been beautiful. 
Indeed it represents heathen idolatry and a vast 
amount of silly and sinful superstitions. But its 
neglected and tottering appearance is no necessary 
proof that the Japanese dualistic system of false 
religion is at a breakdown. The government, in 
order to preserve some of these ancient, artistic 
structures from decay, has granted considerable 
sums of money; and that such edifices as this are 
left in dilapidation is most likely due to lack of 
funds. Our readers would no doubt find it very 
delightful to stroll through these bazaar-like shops, 
lining the crooked, narrow streets. The nicely ar- 
ranged, grotesque wares and fancily carved boxes 
and trays, the manifold variety of highly coloured 
toys, bamboo and lacquer ware, all bear the special 
crest of Miyajima, a torii artistically carved. 

Another renowned site, called Momijidani (ma- 
ple valley), in interest and beauty surpasses any 
other of these unique scenes. That which we shall 
describe now is not commonly found everywhere in 
Japan, and though the best talents of Japanese land- 



150 ENCHANTING MIYAJIMA 

scaping are called into play here, it is mainly for 
the sake of auspiciously impressing and bewitching 
simple pilgrims and visitors from great distances; 
as, for instance, we caught a whole company of 
these little magicians decorating the pathways with 
extra bits of shrubbery, planting evergreens and 
grasses in front of tea-houses and quaintly encir- 
cling the whole with a frill of cement and stone — 
doubtless with the thought to particularly smooth 
the last possible ruffle from the minds of those 
eighty Americans. 

Most of the Japanese thoroughly believe that 
there is no country as beautiful as theirs. True, 
it is beautiful, but a ceaseless repetition of seacoast 
and fisher huts, evergreen hills and little moun- 
tains, terraced fields and islands, after a time be- 
comes somewhat monotonous. Once when showing 
an intelligent Japanese friend an album containing 
bits of beautiful park scenes and magnificent build- 
ings of an American city, with not a grunt of praise 
and but an eye of envy, he remarked, " Oh, how the 
Americans like to exhibit their beauty scenes ! " 
But in order to excel our friend in magnanimity, 
though well remembering the delights of our own 
land, reference is here made to what struck U9 
gs exceedingly beautiful, particularly so from the 



AN EDENIC NOOK 151 

Japanese viewpoint of art. The native artist is 
quite apt to represent nature in too gorgeous col- 
ours; but here neither brush nor pen could do jus- 
tice to such an Edenic nook — this park in a nut- 
shell. It is a collection of the loveliest in nature, 
perfectly harmonized along streamlets and sloping 
hillsides by highly trained aesthetic minds. 

Where this little man may show deficiency in 
appreciating the grand, sublime and majestic, he 
exhibits his greatness in small things. Here, be- 
neath cedar, pine and cryptomeria, artistically ar- 
ranged heaps of grotesque, beautifully veined rocks 
are mounted near tiny, crooked, sand-strewn hill 
paths, surrounded by patches of delightful green 
lawn in hollows and on hillocks, and interspersed 
here and everywhere by vari-coloured azalea, 
shrubby evergreens, rustic bridges and dwarfed 
trees ; quaint little cottages with roofs of cedar bark 
stand on high posts in the placid streamlets, whose 
transparent surface reflects their image, and on 
whose white-sand covered bottom many-coloured, 
tiny maple leaves — as though cleverly inlaid in 
plaster — can be clearly seen. Artificial waterfalls, 
fountains, banana trees, ferns, palms and mossy, 
lichened rock beside dewy caverns; the famous, 
starry-leaved and finely incised Japanese maple sin- 



152 ENCHANTING MIYAJIMA 

gularly adorned in its autumnal splendour of pink 
and crimson, stone lanterns, women and men in 
graceful native costume, stoically and slowly mov- 
ing about in that tranquil morning sunshine — the 
whole unfolded before our gaze — a perfect bit of 
creation. 



XV 

BUESTIKG THE INCUBATOR 

IT is designed -henceforth that education shall 
be so diffused that there may not be a village 
with an ignorant family, — nor a family 
with an ignorant member." This is the closing 
sentence of the Emperor's Eescript regarding edu- 
cation, issued in 1872, which Mr. Mori, an aged 
school teacher, reverently read in our presence. 
" During the subsequent forty years/' he proudly 
remarked, " this noble principle has fructified into 
an abundant harvest. To-day the remotest country 
village has its primary school." 

" But was popular education not known in Japan 
eve Meiji? '^ '' Naka-naka'' (by no means), he 
sagely responded, bobbing his bald head ; "let me 
tell you what Prince Katsura once stated : ' For- 
merly education was for the samurai class only. 
Some of the sons of the inferior classes thought 
it a fortune to enter a temple school, where the 
Buddhist priest taught rudimentary arithmetic and 
the Japanese alphabet. To acquire a commercial 

153 



154f BURSTING THE INCUBATOR 

education in those pre-Meiji days, there was but 
one " class-book," and bright youths could master 
the whole in three days.' But see," the old gentle- 
man continued : " in 1909 the number of elementary 
schools reached twenty-six thousand three hundred 
and eighty; the teachers numbered one hundred 
and thirty-four thousand and the army of pupils has 
swelled to nearly six millions." 

" Then the school budget must be enormous," we 
remarked. " To be sure," he replied, " but that 
over ten thousand of all the teachers have even of 
late years receive less than ten yen * a month salary 
goes to prove that the remuneration is as low as 
our position ought to be exalted. And," he con- 
tinued, tapping the table with his fan, " you know 
our country is very poor and we must not com- 
plain. 

*^ Ah, thanks be to the gods," he exclaimed, as 
out of their hollow sockets his eyes flashed with 
the fire of Yamato, " the Department of Education, 
with a fatherly heart bewails the fact that many 
of us, their humble servants, are so sadly under- 
paid." Then from the little table around which 
we squatted, he drew a crudely bound volume of 
reports, and deftly running his fingers over a 

sorohan, the Oriental counting machine, in a few 
♦ Ten = 50 cents. 



" RED-TAPE " 165 

moments raising his head with a look as cold as 
the figures, said, ^' Honourably condescend to look 
at this fact. ^ The average monthly salary of the 
elementary school teachers of last year (1909) was 
only Yen 16.40.' " 

" But, Mr. Mori," we put in, " while rejoicing 
with you over the wonderful strides made in edu- 
cation, forgive our suggesting a few points which, 
however, might not have been unobserved by you. 
One is the extent to which ' red-tapeism ' seems 
to be carried in the elementary schools. A great 
number of my friends among you hard-working 
teachers, I notice, must be at their post at 8 a.m. 
and remain till five and sometimes six p.m. But 
knowing that school opened at nine and closed at 
three o'clock, I naturally asked some of them 
whether they were so excessively busy. * No,' one 
of them replied, ' we only remain overtime because 
we think it courteous to tarry till the principal 
withdraws.' ' But why does not the principal leave 
earlier ? ' I queried. 'Now this question, as you 
well know, because it concerned their superior, they 
were naturally reluctant to answer. But one, par- 
ticularly confidential, ventured to say that the prin- 
cipal, in order to prove his enthusiastic devotion to 
duty and to avoid criticism from his superiors be- 



156 BURSTING THE INCUBATOR 

cause of any apparent lack of interest in his charge, 
must remain indefinitely. It would appear that 
these helpless teachers are made a sort of scapegoat 
because of the needless rules which govern the prin- 
cipal. One cannot but be heartily sorry that some 
of those hollow-cheeked and emaciated young fel- 
lows are thus deprived of the precious time which 
they long to devote to bodily and mental recrea- 
tion." 

The wary old man, though realizing the strength 
of our position, simply grunted " H'm," with a 
nod of acquiescence, and sipped a few more drops 
of green tea. 

" Regarding the term, as well as the general 
subjects taught," we continued, " perhaps there is 
not such a great difference between Japan and 
the West, is there ? " ^^ Perhaps not," said he. 
" By a recent Imperial Ordinance the term has 
been extended from four to six years, and the sub- 
jects taught in this course comprise morals, Japa- 
nese history, language, geography, science, drawing 
and painting, and gymnastics. To this curriculum 
manual training, etc., for boys, and sewing for 
girls may be added as supplementary." 

" Fine," we assented ; but for fear of committing 
an intrusion we avoided some other pointed ques- 



SWARMS OF BLACK HEADS 157 

tions. The schools always seem to be crowded, gen- 
erally giving a stranger the impression of too many 
chickens for one hen. In different localities the 
number of students is far in excess of accommo- 
dations, and the classes must attend alternately in 
fore- and afternoon. In the cities and larger towns 
many of the buildings would do credit to any school 
board, but in the country they are often frail and 
flimsy, sometimes being merely old straw-covered 
temples. But be the building what it may, and 
the grounds large or small, to a Westerner's eye 
they always seem out of proportion to the aston- 
ishing crowds of black heads which burst from the 
doors and throng the remotest corners. 

In the meantime, however, this veteran sensei 
found it necessary to close the shoji of the adjoin- 
ing little room. Often have we passed houses at 
night when a strange noise like this caused me to 
halt in amazement. The four or ^ve youngsters 
around the lighted lamp hanging close to the mat- 
ting in this little room, each one regardless of his 
neighbour, some in a high-pitched key, others with 
a sonorous, low mumble, were preparing their les- 
sons. These vocal efforts were participated in by 
some of their elders reading shoddy newspapers and 
cheap magazines. Though loving those almond- 



168 BURSTING THE INCUBATOR 

eyed girlies and bristle-headed boys as his own life, 
in pure Japanese fashion mentioning them in derog- 
atory terms before others, the old man grunted, 
^' Those good-for-nothing, ignorant creatures dis- 
turb you shamefully." This statement was a call 
for us to rise to the occasion and, true to custom, 
be as extravagant in our compliments of the chil- 
dren as our host was in his disparagement. 

" No disturbance whatever," we stoutly affirmed, 
and begged the privilege to hear the youngest of 
the crowd show his skill in reading those " turkey 
tracks." With seeming reluctance he yielded, and 
rather than moving the company into our room, 
we were escorted into their midst. One lad, like 
many of his comrades, was an adept in the art of 
drawing. Marvellous was the skill of a bashful 
lassie, though behind in years. Dipping the camel- 
hair brush in India ink, she could write the most 
complicated Chinese characters with firm and grace- 
ful curves, " and with the ease and certainty of 
Giotto in turning his 0'' 

Walking home through the dark, we mused on the 
stupendous task Japan had and still has, in bring- 
ing her educational system up to the standard of 
the West. Libraries in common schools are yet 
hardly worthy of mention, though they may be 



HOPEFUL OMENS 159 

found in higher institutions. Still, hopeful omens 
are appearing above the horizon. Passing through 
the spacious halls of a Girls^ jSTormal School, in 
the library we joyfully noticed, among the many 
oddly bound volumes, a reference Bible. In the 
history class room the walls were lined with large 
prints of a number of the earth's great men. 
Though it seemed almost like the Emersonian col- 
location, " Jesus, Socrates and Buddha," yet those 
of the West — Homer, Aristotle, Socrates, Luther 
and others were separately classed from the Asiatics, 
where with pleasure and surprise we noticed our 
Lord first in order. Then came Confucius and 
other sages. 

There is one great fault found, however, by vari- 
ous writers, with Japan's common school system; 
namely, that the subjects taught are too limited 
and abstruse; and in the second place, the system 
is defective as a means of turning out good citizens. 
In the higher institutions the student is abandoned 
to intellectual gorging. He attends about twenty- 
five lectures a week, daily sitting in a poorly lighted 
and sometimes overcrowded room from four to 
eight hours, scribbling in his ^^ almighty '' note- 
book. When he returns to his lodging all desire or 
energy for independent study is exhausted. This 



160 BURSTING THE INCUBATOR 

lecture system may account for the fact that the 
Japanese mind is " rather a knowing than a think- 
ing mind," as their own scholars have been free 
to admit. 

In classics Confucius is substituted for Plato, 
and the " Chinese classics occupy the place which 
Latin and Greek have held in English and Ameri- 
can education for centuries." ^erve-racking and 
comparatively barren are the students' exertions in 
this wilderness of Chinese literature, which necessi- 
tates the learning of fifty thousand or more ideo- 
graphs. 

With every cycling year, sons of the soil con- 
stantly swell the student ranks in the higher insti- 
tutions of learning. The sentiment that the farmer 
is the very basis of the nation seems to him devoid 
of the true ring, since as an individual he is still 
regarded with but scant respect, l^ow he bursts 
forth beyond the narrow horizon of the slimy paddy- 
fields in which his forefathers have contentedly 
" toiled and moiled " for centuries. The young 
man's 'primary object is in many instances not the 
building up of a well-rounded character, and the 
noble discharging of his duty as a man and citizen, 
but rather an easier life — he wants to become a 
distinguished man. With his vision concerning 



" YOUNG JAPAN " 161 

manual labour entirely out of focus, this eager as- 
pirant after distinction rather than knowledge 
rushes through the Middle School on to the High 
School and even University. He and many more 
like him, on the long course of life's race, easily 
stumble and fall, and not unnaturally must live the 
life of disappointed and embittered men. 

Take an expression from a class of twenty Middle 
School students as to their choice of a vocation, 
and the replies will usually run thus, " Statesman," 
''General," "Diplomat," "Doctor," "Lawyer," 
"Banker"; but "Merchant" and "Scientific 
Agriculturist " we have only heard a few times. 
Marvellous air castles! I^ot long ago a certain 
writer estimated that among the sixty-three thou- 
sand graduates issuing yearly from the various edu- 
cational institutions, over eighteen thousand have, 
apart from manual labour, absolutely no vacancy to 
enter. 

" Japan gives precedence to no religion," a cer- 
tain writer states. True, differences of religious 
beliefs obtaining among instructors and students 
render the inculcation of any one faith impossible. 
Yet is the above statement somewhat misleading. 
Granting the thankworthy fact that various edu- 
cators, and the government at large, look upon 



16a BURSTING THE INCUBATOR 

Christianity with the greatest of tolerance, the 
masses still regard it as an alien religion. 
That none of their priests ever set foot in the 
schools of Japan is also true, but it is far from 
correct to state that "no religious lesson is ever 
given in any shape or form." For the moral in- 
struction taught in all schools below the University 
is vitally related to the religion which " this people 
are in the habit of claiming as the source of their 
success and virtues — the religion of emperor and 
ancestor worship." For an illustration: Do teach- 
ers ever take their schools or classes (and how often 
they may be seen!) to renowned shrines and moun- 
tain resorts without invariably leading them to 
the sacred portals for worship? In 1912 the late 
emperor had barely been buried when the people 
by thousands daily flocked to his tomb for worship. 
On the first day on which the public was admitted, 
over seven hundred pupils of a Girls' Higher 
School were marched to the imperial mausoleum; 
they purified their hands and mouths with water 
specially prepared, then knelt down on the gravel, 
reverently bowing their heads to the ground. 

New Japan is to be looked for in the schools, 
where uniforms of all kinds, muskets and military 
drills, often play as conspicuous a function as do 



« ROCKING " THE WINDOWS 163 

books and letters. In the towns and villages of any 
section may be seen long platoons of little school- 
boys at play, marching with bamboo poles for 
swords and chubby babies strapped on their backs 
in lieu of knapsacks, singing their national anthems 
with a warlike roar. 

All common and some higher grade schools have 
_eiT athletic exhibitions, which take place on the 
school grounds twice a year. Friends and parents 
of the pupils being invited, come in immense crowds, 
and greatly contribute to the success of this gala 
day. ISTearly all performances are really contests 
in which the participating boys or girls evince a 
remarkable degree of training. One of those gath- 
erings which we witnessed was most exciting. Some 
of the contests were similar to those of the West ; — 
others again were entirely novel. But monkey-like 
agility and almost lightning speed, along with a 
good deal of pluck, seen in these little brown-faced 
youths, make the beholder feel as though he had 
been transported to some mysterious planet. 

At that time a bunch of boys aged about fifteen 
were bent on mischief. During a lull in the exer- 
cises, they strayed past our house, and with a well- 
aimed rock embellished one of our windows with 
starry figures. Being near the gate and thoroughly 



164 BURSTING THE INCUBATOR 

understanding the situation, we chased those fleet, 
short legs down a main thoroughfare, whence they 
darted, like gophers to their holes, into narrow, 
winding passages between ramshackle houses and 
mud walls. There they got a little advance of us, 
not being well acquainted with needles' eyes such as 
these. Unable to near them on foot, though kn'~>w- 
ing their movements, we walked in a^iocher dix. '^"'.^ 
home. Then we located the whole troop on the sea 
beach, calmly partaking of their lunch, which they 
had brought in their long kimono sleeves. Sting- 
ing was their surprise, and as we stood near one 
of the dear boys, the others, with a wink of the eye, 
signalled a detour, and like a flock of snipes in a 
gust of wind, almost in an instant they were out 
of sight. But we, too, had taken care of our boy, 
and with him in one hand and the wheel in the 
other, we took a walk to the school, where our 
young friend, with big beads of perspiration stand- 
ing on his forehead, made an unwilling roll call of 
his accomplices to the principal. This episode 
ended very pleasantly, and never since have stones 
found their way through our windows. 

At another boys' school, amid the many contests 
which tested the competitors' skill and endurance, 
was one where a set of eight or ten ran a complicated 



PRAISEWORTHY PROGRESS 165 

race. The signal gun had barely popped when they 
were already stalking over a rope-net, in which 
some of them of course got entangled, while others 
leaped over them ; at the very next breath they had 
to crawl through the rounds of a ladder which was 
laid in their path, and what a jamming they had 
when two chubby fellows tried to squeeze through 
one space. Soon the whole bunch essayed to be 
first in running over two long beams suspended 
lengthwise along the track. Then again they were 
up against some meshes of rope hung up on poles 
as high as their heads, through which they had to 
make their way ; after which, and to finish the race, 
they climbed up a scaffolding ten feet high and, 
hanging by their hands, moved on forward ten or 
twelve feet and then leaped down. The whole thing 
was executed on a three-hundred-foot circle. 

The reader must remember that this does not 
profess to be a complete description of either the 
excellencies or defects of Japanese schools ; but con- 
sidering that no such a thing as a public school 
system was known until four decades past, and also 
what moral and educational standards the youths 
of former days were gauged by, it is not a wonder- 
ment that there are so many defects, but rather that 
such strides of progress have been made. 



166 BURSTING THE INCUBATOR 

What if students should aggravatingly practice 
their laughable '^ English " on you ; write letters 
whose odd and outlandishly constructed sentences 
are so mirth-provoking as to cause one^s sides to 
shake ; what if some of those young men should ap- 
pear unappreciative of one's kindness or forget to 
be as polite to the foreigner as to their own people ; 
what if the most exemplary ones of the faculty 
should be known, though but a few times in the 
year, to indulge in drinking bouts and attend geisha 
sprees — for which customs the moral standards of 
the country are responsible? 

Though cold facts could be cited to corroborate 
the above, it is but fair play to also take account 
of the good points. All honest observers would 
gladly voice the sentiment of Bishop Welldon of 
England, who in speaking of the Japanese Foreign 
Language students, for instance, in words of high- 
est praise commended the teachableness of school 
teachers, clerks and even military officers; these 
showed a persistence where young men of other 
countries would give vent to impatience or be too 
proud to take the trouble of learning in such an 
humble way. Great is their thirst, and an educa- 
tion they will have at any cost ! 



XVI 

FUISTEEAL PAGEANTS 

FUNEKALS in Japan are a kind of solemn 
festivity; as a rule they are imposing af- 
fairs, bordering on the spectacular. Pro- 
cessions among the wealthy, in rural as well as urban 
districts, are almost equal to Fourth of July 
parades. The cortege is headed with banners, then 
follow a hundred or more men, each carrying in 
a vase a sort of bouquet of evergreens, then also as 
many of flowers, ^ve or six feet high. Then may 
come a similar crowd carrying artificial flowers. In 
other cases again the flowers are placed on gaudily 
painted, four-wheeled carts drawn by coolies. Next 
in order are a few large cages, either borne or also 
on carts, which contain a flock of pigeons to be re- 
leased at the grave with the design of accompany- 
ing the departed spirit to his abode of bliss; then 
about twenty carrying cakes and fruits on trays. In 
the centre of the procession are a number of men 
bearing boards with inscriptions in Chinese char- 

167 



16S FUNERAL PAGEANTS 

acters, quotations from the classics and famous say- 
ings painted on them ; also the posthumous appella- 
tion given to the deceased by the priest of his 
temple. 

The elegantly adorned bier, often supported by 
eight coolies dressed in a white muslin garb, is pre- 
ceded by a number of pipers clad in flowing, cop- 
peras-coloured garments, playing a doleful, monot- 
onous dirge. Two or three yellow-skinned, hard- 
faced old priests of high rank, arrayed in scarlet 
and gold and wearing silken mitres, dash out of the 
house of the dead, and under cover of an enormous 
crimson umbrella, which a servant carries over each 
one's head, they severally proceed to their ancient- 
style palanquin, which four men dressed in light 
blue, stiffly starched, kite-shaped coverings, bear 
by means of a fifteen-foot, richly lacquered ridge- 
pole. These august personages having entered, at 
once disappear from sight as the attendants close 
the little silk-curtained doors. They in turn are 
followed by about ten priests riding in jinrikishas, 
adorned in their finest regalia and with heads 
freshly shaven. Each of these priests is attended 
by his satellite, and that one in turn by a humble 
temple servant, carrying a big vermilion-lacquered 
and oddly shaped folding chair. 




RIKISHA PULLERS DRAWING LOTS FOR PASSENGERS 




FUNERAL FLOWER CARTS 



FEASTING AT FUNERALS 169 

The mourners and relatives are next in order; 
the men wear a cheap, ridiculous-looking head cov- 
ering made of rushes; the women are generally 
dressed in white, with gauze wrapped about their 
heads. If the funeral is from a well-to-do city 
family, the procession of gentlemen sympathizers 
may appear in frock coats and plug hats; com- 
monly, however, they, as well as the ladies, wear 
their best kimono. 

Before the funeral leaves the house, it is cus- 
tomary to give all the friends a feast, when sahe 
drinking is quite freely indulged in. The coffins 
are ordinarily square wooden boxes, sometimes mere 
tubs. This latter method has always appeared to 
us as most fearfully revolting. When but a few 
weeks in Japan, we were attending a peasant 
funeral. An unexpected delay at the house occurred 
because the coffin had not yet arrived ; but when it 
did, our uninitiated eyes failed to recognize it. 
" But where is the coffin ? " we queried. " This is 
it,'' was the reply, pointing to a new but cheap tub 
about two feet in diameter and less than three feet 
in height. Like a flash our thoughts took cog- 
nizance of all that must be associated with putting 
the earthly remains of a full-gro^m man into such 
a cramped-up position, with an ugly lid crowded 



170 FUNERAL PAGEANTS 

over his head — and genuine horror possessed our 
hearts. 

The corpse is dressed in a white kimono ; friends 
shave the scalp and place some of the hair in the 
temple for worship, or again it is buried with the 
body. This white kimono shroud is always crossed 
from left to right, while when alive they invariably 
cross it from right to left — except foreigners, such as 
ourselves, who became an object of derision and the 
cause of consternation to the Japanese in our home 
when they saw us come down the stairway — dressed 
for burial, in a cool summer kimono ignorantly 
flapped from left to right. 

When the Buddhists bury, they place six rin in 
the coffin (ten rin is equal to one-half cent), repre- 
senting the Buddhist " Amen," consisting of six 
syllables, " E"a-mu-a-me-butsu.'' According to law, 
no Japanese can be buried before twenty-four hours 
after death ; intended of course to make sure there 
is no mistake. It is stated that most Japanese, 
especially among the poorer classes, die at night; 
said to be due to the impure atmosphere of their 
tightly closed, unventilated and overcrowded little 
rooms. When the funeral departs from the house, 
at the front door one of the friends sets a bunch 
of rice straw on fire, and the house is swept. The 



UNDECOROUS MOURNERS 171 

immediate mourners being ceremoniously defiled, 
must for a period of nearly twenty days burn puri- 
fying fire before the gods ; at the end of which time 
they send presents to the friends, indicating that 
their period of purification is completed. 

Buddhism has always favoured cremation, and 
hence in various graveyards, large and small, the 
foreign visitor is confronted with a repulsive-look- 
ing place, the crematory. The procession to this 
place may seem quite decorous. But immediately 
the scene changes. While the coffin is shoved on an 
iron sheet within a brick furnace and a brisk, 
raging fire is kindled by the coolies, that the im- 
mediate relatives squat in a circle, smoking their 
indispensable little pipes and telling stories, is by 
no means an incredible tale. At such times 
nauseous odours wafted by the winds contaminate 
the air; in particular is this the case where the 
crematory often consists of nothing more than a few 
stones under on open shed. 

A Japanese funeral hardly ever impresses one 
with that peculiar solemnity which is always seen 
at such occasions in the West. The more educated 
behave themselves with considerable dignity; but 
that they have just been indulging in eating and 
drinking, and also because of the peculiarity of 



172 FUNERAL PAGEANTS 

temperament as a people, it is no uncommon thing 
to see one burst out in laughter or noisy demonstra- 
tions while in the funeral cortege. There are no 
bursts of weeping or any other audible signs of 
great grief at funerals, though now and then the 
anguish-wrung heart of one of the lady mourners 
may find a little relief in a few tears, which, how- 
ever, with gestures of self-reproach, are hastily 
wiped away. But the great majority of her sisters, 
to say nothing of the men, appear stolid and cold- 
hearted. These grief -smitten mortals have no 
wooden hearts and are not entirely devoid of senti- 
ment, but seem to refrain from shedding honest 
tears not so much because of superior self-control 
or strength of character as on account of their 
bondage to an antiquated, rigid custom, which if 
they should violate, would likely bring down upon 
them a torrent of sneering laughter. 

But it is gi'atifying to state that Christian 
funerals are conducted with more decorum. We 
have followed the bier when the shades of night 
had already dispersed the gloomy tints in the west- 
ern sky, visits of this kind to the abode of the dead 
at night not being at all infrequent. The simple 
reason for this may be that the grave-diggers chatted 
and smoked too long; the two men with the coffin 



FUNERAL NEAR MIDNIGHT 173 

carried over their shoulders by means of a pole, 
had not arrived from town any earlier; or that 
the haughty old priest suited his own convenience 
in coming. We well recall one such dreary, lone- 
some night. The only child, and a hoy at that, of 
a noble Christian man was to be buried by the side 
of his mother. How touching the scene when his 
father and the remaining relatives gathered for the 
last time around the casket, and what is so exceed- 
ingly rare, tears of sympathy as well as sorrow 
flowed freely. The funeral quietly left the house, 
each one in the procession carrying a white paper 
lantern. The bier, borne by two men, was preceded 
by another carrying a square post on which were 
inscribed the child^s name and age, with some 
Bible quotation. It was nine o'clock when we 
passed six or seven old Buddhist temples lining one 
side of an entire street, behind which the burial 
took place. Arriving at the last temple, we stood 
before the large, clumsy, rustic gates, which soon 
swung open, and through a narrow passage along 
a high mud wall, proceeded by the help of our little 
lanterns, without which we would have stumbled 
against a lot of old stone idols. 

How dreadful the place! Only a few gleaming 
lanterns — ^no star nor moon was shining. One side 



114i FUNERAL PAGEANTS 

of the cemetery was lined with massive old pines 
and the other by a high wall — all adding to the 
gloom of a dark night in a heathen graveyard^ whose 
many thousands of silent sleepers had died without 
the blessed Gospel. The little tombstones stood 
strikingly close together, reminding one of an im- 
mense phalanx, all subjects of the " pale horse and 
his rider." By the open grave we stood upon tum- 
bled-down idols and tombstones, and elbowed a large 
stone god whose head had crumbled away years ago ; 
this fact was of no little significance to us as an 
earnest prayer was offered and the parting song, 
" There's a land that is fairer than day,'* echoed 
back from the near-by temples a prophecy of the 
downfall of heathenism. 



XVII 
HOJSTOURING THE SPIRITS 

IT is early in the morning when darkness and 
quiet are still brooding over the earth and 
Japan's busy toilers have not yet risen from 
their slumber. The missionary himself, still asleep, 
becomes suddenly half-conscious of something un- 
usual. Hark ! What means this tramping of many 
wooden shoes, and the weird-sounding " tap-tap '' of 
a little gong? The noise becomes more real, and 
looking out of the window, we see a crowd of men 
and women with a sprinkling of white paper lan- 
terns passing our house on their way to the near-by 
seashore. The procession is led by one carrying a 
Shinto lantern and a tray, on which are cooked rice 
and other morsels. A mysterious feeling creeps 
over the beholder as these hastily rush on at a half 
trot. The gong is still beating, and a few in the 
crowd chant in low tones some plaintive native 
melody. Why in such haste? Is some one sick, 
or is there any distress? Another scene explains 
the foregoing. 

175 



176 HONOURING THE SPIRITS 

One evening about eight o'clock, while out near 
the beach, we are met by a crowd similar to the 
one seen that early morning. Tramp, tramp, they 
hasten on to the water's edge. All is dark but for 
those white gleaming lanterns. Halting, they sing, 
swaying en masse from side to side. Suddenly the 
leader of the procession advances, and wading out 
a short distance, he gently places the tray upon the 
ocean's bosom. iNext we see his large white lantern 
floating away upon some rolling billow. Of a 
sudden the light is extinguished, and serves as a 
signal for the company to return homeward. 

We walk along the shore a few steps, attracted 
by another light, thinking it to be that of some 
fisherman, but it is simply a repetition of the same 
sad story. Only a tossing lantern fastened to a stick. 
Curiously enough, the whistling winds are not suf- 
ficient to extinguish the gleam of the fast-decreasing 
taper. 

These processions are a part of Japan's dualistic 
religion — Buddhist and Shinto — and usually occur 
as often as the funeral. It is believed that during 
forty-nine days after death, the spirit dwells up 
underneath the roof of his own home, and at the 
expiration of this period the friends of the deceased 
give him the final farewell at his ascension to a place 



GHOSTLY VISITORS 177 

which is a substitute for the Christian's heaven. 
^o matter whether the departed dwelled near sea- 
shore, lakeside or river, on this memorable forty- 
ninth day this farewell ceremony ends at the wa- 
ter's edge. 

A short time after, about the middle of August, 
there followed the annual Bon festival, when 
fond recollections of lost faces and broken ties most 
mightily stir the sympathetic chord in the heart 
of this entire race. This festival continues for three 
or four days, during which time it is believed the 
ancestral spirits return to their homes. " At such 
a time, the ghostly visitors are banqueted and feted 
with a pious attention which few of them ever en- 
joyed in their terrestrial existence." In the evening 
twilight of the first day, at the front entrance hangs 
the globular lantern whose soft light is intended to 
guide the departed spirit back to his earthly habita- 
tion. For the same purpose the streets also are 
lighted with many of these bright-coloured il- 
luminators. 

At the bend of the road, beneath the dome of 
gnarly old pines and luxurious evergreen, stands 
the moss-covered shrine of the village patron god, 
around whose venerable premises mourners for the 
departed now and anon have loved to linger. 



178 HONOURING THE SPIRITS 

A sturdy youthfiil son of Nippon, still partly 
arrayed as his ancient sires, with knightly mien and 
solemn stride, approaches to light the two stone lan- 
terns that silently mark the mysterious portals. He 
places a little ladder against the stone shaft, claps 
his hands and reverently bows; then ascending, 
lights the frail taper inside the tiny paper window. 
Stepping down, he claps his hands and bows again, 
then vanishes in the darkness. 

Human beings throng the winding thoroughfares 
as noisily, though also as sadly, as on their loved 
ones' funeral day. Amid them can be found mem- 
bers of the various homes that have returned from 
distant colonies and islands of the Empire to unite 
with their own kindred at this annual memorial 
day. The little taper in the lantern at the doorway 
gradually flickers out and the clang of the temple 
bell ceases ; but lo, early the next morning, troops of 
town and country people, bearing flowers and pine 
twigs with incense whose fragrance resembles the 
lavender, make for the quaint cemeteries. These 
are placed as an offering before the little stone slabs 
that tightly pack the graveyard. Out of a wooden 
bucket with a toy dipper, copious supplies of water 
are poured upon the tombstones, quenching the an- 
cestors' thirst. 



WHITE-CROSS LANTERNS 179 

'Now tlieir religious frenzy reaches its climax. 
With the approach of another night one can hear 
from every cottage the almost constant tapping of 
little bells, and a passerby, through the sJioji, may 
see the entire household, though but stupid fisher- 
men or simple farmers they may be, with heads 
bent low, in audible monotones piteously praying 
before the family shrine. Their inmost soul is 
grieved and stirred ; and though believing their loved 
ones' spirits back with them, it's but for one brief 
moment. Everywhere, through the daytime and es- 
pecially after sunset, one is constantly haunted by 
this gruesome and weird and monotonous tinkling 
of bells. The third evening the multitudes take the 
flowers and incense from the home shrines to yonder 
seashore, where to the departing spirits they bid 
another sad farewell. 

Reverting to the second evening : a band of Chris- 
tian workers, carrying red paper lanterns — each 
crested with a white cross — wind their way past 
festive throngs through the narrow streets to a cen- 
tral temple, where wily priests in spectral robes, 
amid dim candle lights, with occult incantations 
enchant the soul-blind masses. Halting immediately 
in front of that gloomy structure, to my amazement 
the native preacher hangs a number of these con- 



180 HONOURING THE SPIRITS 

spicuous lanterns high up on the cornices of one of 
the two large stone toro which serve as light-bearers 
to the gods. The clamour of the ribald crowd at 
once ceases ; they swarm around us, and rather than 
thinking our cross-inscribed lanterns a desecration 
of their toro, they even allow the preacher to ascend 
to the third flight of its stone steps, whence he, like 
some prophet of old, rams at their superstition and 
idolatry; solemnly and with marked effect speaks 
of the world's Creator and Saviour and clearly de- 
fines sin, God's righteousness and awful Judgment 
Bay. 



XVIII 
THE FARMEE AND HIS DOMAIN^ 

DESPITE the fact that the enormous increase 
of factories draws many sons of the soil to 
the cities, about sixty per cent of the popu- 
lation of this country is still engaged in agriculture. 
Japanese farm life affords an unusual amount of 
interest to the newcomer. Though yet so primitive 
in their ways when compared with American or 
European methods, these peasants' primeval trend 
to industry at once differentiates them from Eastern 
races of a more sluggish type. The farmer here, 
as well as of any other country, finds his the most 
independent life, though from statistics obtainable, 
most of this class are among the poor, who are forced 
to annually struggle for a meagre livelihood. For 
instance, the total income of a village community 
of some eight hundred persons annually amounts to 
about six thousand ^ve hundred dollars, or about 
eight dollars per head. 

But the most astonishing point here is that out 
of this total income these villagers pay no less than 

181 



182 THE FARMER AND HIS DOMAIN 

fifteen hundred dollars, or about twenty-three per 
cent, direct taxes. Then when we add the indirect 
taxation, the total easily reaches thirty-five per cent. 
If history can be relied on, this crushing burden 
has not been his merely the last few years, but even 
in the days of feudalism it was said of him that 
what the farmer dreaded was not so much war, as 
famine, plague and above all the tax-gatherer, who 
exacted something like seventy per cent of the pro- 
duce of his fields. One daimyo, who had imposed 
new taxes and demanded more rice than it was 
possible for the distressed farmers to raise, resorted 
to most drastic measures. Those who refused or 
were unable to pay, were dressed in a rough straw 
coat — such as are still used by the peasantry in 
rainy weather. Their hands were tied behind their 
backs, the straw coats set on fire, and of these 
wretched victims some even burned to death; the 
excruciating pain led others to drown themselves or 
end their lives by violently bumping their bodies 
against the ground. 

To-day, however, these industrious, hard-working 
farmers can, as a family of, say ^ve^ live on an 
average of but ten dollars per month. Their fare 
is thus extremely simplified — ^the luxury of salted 
fish, which otherwise is considered a low-priced arti- 



FARMERS' FRUGAL FARE 18S 

cle in Japan, is indulged in about once a week. 
Many eat as the staple food a poor kind of rice, 
and many more barley and rice mixed. Beans and 
sweet potatoes are by-products and add a flavour to 
their diet. The natives are very fond of greens, 
young sprouts or the tops of the Japanese radish. 
These are cooked and eaten with a kind of briny 
bean sauce. But the last resort of the most destitute 
is generally the enormous, white radish, which sim- 
ply prepared and though scantily nutritious, affords 
them a meal. 

This frugal mode of living is not so much from 
choice as of somewhat painful necessity. Japan, 
with the exception of the Hokkaido, a small area in 
the north, affords the beholder no fertile, American- 
like farms or the broad, rolling fields of grain of 
England or the Continent, for here the soil is nat- 
urally quite unfertile and fields very small, irregu- 
lar, and running from the so-called paddy fields in 
well-kept terraces to almost halfway up the moun- 
tain side ; then also it must ever be borne in mind 
that an immense tract of this mountainous country 
(eighty-six per cent) is totally unfit for agriculture, 
hence that which is available for tillage and cultiva- 
tion is utilized to the last square yard: prodigies 
of toil — a sure sign of population pressure. 



184f THE FARMER AND HIS DOMAIN 

But it is this unique picturesqueness which is the 
charm of Japan's rural scenery. The serpent-trail- 
like paths and narrow roads, often barely allowing 
a little cart to move along and forcing the occa- 
sional cyclist, coming from an opposite direction, 
to dismount and with wheel on his shoulder crawl 
down the embankment; the thatched huts or else 
grey, heavy-tiled farmhouses ordinarily pasted, as 
it were, in little village groups on the steep hillsides 
(since more suitable soil must be reserved for til- 
lage), or else huddled together under persimmon 
trees or pine below a wooded knoll ; here and there 
artificial ponds constructed for the purpose of irri- 
gating; the little evergreen groves, which with a 
shady dome overhang the many wayside shrines, or 
else in some little nook of the road a few clusters 
of slender, polished bamboos; the old graveyards 
thickly set with moss-covered, rustic tombstones — 
appearing from a distance like a battalion of sturdy 
little Japanese soldiers guarding the silent dead; 
the banks of every little streamlet meandering down 
past terraces and slimy rice fields, lined with pines 
and other small growth which commonly form the 
centre support of slender and unique-shaped stacks, 
composed of neatly fixed-up bunches of rice and 
barley straw, reaching as high as thirty feet to the 



CHARM OF RURAL SCENERY 185 

limbs — this often in the place of a barnyard; the 
whole country being made up of striking, miniature 
valleys and mountains, with the variety of climate 
found between Canada and Florida, where through 
the entire year the carefully fertilized fields, with 
almost magical rapidity, give birth to a harvest of 
barley and immediately again are turned into a 
paddy field, where young shoots of transplanted rice 
go to make the other main harvest of the second 
half year. All this combines to invariably create in 
the beholder a longing to put the scene on canvas. 

But where the eye is ravished with delight, the 
olfactory organs are too often outraged. For the 
enriching of the soil; barnyard fertilizers and others 
made from fish are more or less utilized; then the 
city sewage is carted away to the rural districts, 
nightly and almost daily, by human labour — ^buxom 
red-cheeked farmer lassies often sharing in this toil. 
These processions leave an " aroma in their wake 
to which the native olfactory nerves seem to be 
proof," but which to the sensitive Occidental de- 
nudes travelling in Japan's urban sections of much 
of its enjoyment. Furthermore, in the interior the 
beauty of nature and the otherwise quaint and con- 
genial habits of the simple peasant folk are not a 
little marred by the often unhoused and ill-smelling 



186 THE FARMER AND HIS DOMAIN 

latrines which profane the front of many country 
dwellings. The flowers and miniature landscape 
gardens, of course, must be in the back yard ! 

Besides rice and barley, there are also numerous 
by-products, such as a great variety of beans, sweet 
potatoes and especially radishes. These radishes 
are hauled in an almost interminable procession of 
cart loads to the seacoast towns, where they are 
either sold to residents there or shipped on to the 
cities. There is such a great demand for them that 
the fields are cleared of thousands of tons within 
a week or two. Rich and poor pickle them with 
salt in casks, after which, though not of the most 
pleasant odour, they serve as a table delicacy. 

Thrashing is still done with the flail, or else the 
grain is drawn through a long, sharp-pronged in- 
strument. In many sections the land is all culti- 
vated by hand, or otherwise there is nothing used 
but the old-fashioned, one-handled plough, which 
the sandalled farmer may be seen lugging on his 
back along the narrow path to his little farm — a 
treasured heritage through many generations — 
driving before him a big-horned ox or a wiry, mis- 
chievous and unreliable little horse, which carries 
loads on his back, plods along in the mud of the 
paddy fields, and can thrive on food and treatment 



A TOILING BEEHIVE 187 

which no other horse in the world could. For after 
fifty million people are fed from thirty-five hun- 
dred square miles of tillable land, none remains for 
meadows, and this little pony simply has to submit 
to a diet of coarse beans, barley and rice straw. 

In certain sections, where even the excuse of a 
plough is rarely used, a three-pronged hoe is sub- 
stituted. Some men stagger through the mud with 
baskets of fertilizer, others hoe, and women, not 
only knee-deep in the mire but with hands sub- 
merged to the elbows, fill up every uneven place 
and work the soil as their Occidental sister kneads 
the dough. When a field is fully smooth and mud- 
dikes all in trim, the farmer gets his bags of rice 
which, with streamers of white paper prayers float- 
ing over them, have for days been left wateir- 
soaked in the yard, and which he now scatters over 
the slimy and tiny patches. 

Imagine a lot of men and women up to their 
knees in the cold mud of the rice fields, or out 
sowing barley on an area of twenty acres of land, 
with here and there a toiling ox adding more vi- 
vacity to the beehive. The whole looks like so many 
employees of one little plantation, rather than 
twenty or thirty different masters, with their wives, 
sons and daughters, following agriculture in the 



188 THE FARMER AND HIS DOMAIN 

twentieth century! But Western customs have be- 
gun to penetrate even into the rural districts. Here 
ox-carts and bicycles are equally in use; also now 
and then can be found a little gasoline engine, which 
may in time crowd out these enchanting water 
wheels, plied by rippling streamlets and miniature 
waterfalls, and displace the many old-fashioned foot 
mortars used to hull rice and barley, as well as the 
typical Oriental ^' upper and nether millstone," 
which may yet be found in nearly every dwelling. 

Again, in their apparel the new and the old are 
strikingly exhibited. When coming to town in his 
best, the farmer may be adorned with either a new 
or second-hand, and often too large, felt hat, Japa- 
nese kimono with the lower ends turned up and 
fastened under his sash — probably intended to make 
more conspicuous a suit of Western underwear and 
a pair of Congress shoes. But still more curious 
the scene when these agriculturists take advantage 
of a rainy day, and in whole companies, while en- 
gaged in animated conversation, come marching tan- 
dem into town to do their trading. All smoke tiny 
pipes, looking like ordinary pencils at a distance. 
Their headgear is usually but a piece of thin towel- 
ling twisted like a girdle around their heads. They 
either have a blanket over their shoulders, Indian- 



FRIENDLY PEASANTS 189 

fashion, or else a large sheet of yellow oiled paper. 
Some may come in various out-of-style overcoats, 
but all of them carry the picturesque umbrella — 
made of bamboo and paper, rendered waterproof by 
saturating it with a preparation of unripe per- 
simmon juice. 

To be alone for months and years in the interior 
amidst this thronging Asian life, at times seems 
most fearfully strange. Still these peasants, whose 
natural surroundings, not much unlike those of the 
Alpine dweller or the orange grower of sunny 
Sicily, tend to produce a more serene and kindly 
character than that of the daring and restless coast 
settlers, are very hospitable. The moment one 
reaches the margin of a seacoast town, the first man 
or child he meets turns on his heels and dashes 
down the street yelling '"'' Ee-jin/' which term, when 
applied to the foreigner, savours much more of dis- 
respect than the abbreviation " Jap " to which this 
people so strenuously object. Be one a Christian 
preacher, or a salesman with some novel article, here 
is his crowd without the least effort. But when 
weary from his journey, in quest of a little yadoya 
at which to rest, the sooner the polite landlord takes 
him almost by force from the close contact of a 
staring and ill-smelling phalanx of old and yoimg. 



190 THE FARMER AND HIS DOMAIN 

blind and seeing, clothed and otherwise, back into 
the cozy rear rooms facing the tiny garden, the 
better he is pleased. 

But enter the farmer's abode, though ever so hum- 
ble, and there is invariably placed near you a square 
cushion to sit upon and a wee cup of hot tea as a 
token of friendship. Let a stranger meet a crowd 
of stolid-faced youngsters en route to school or at 
play with their brothers or sisters on their backs, 
unlike the children of the town, these will make 
pleasing, respectful bows and otherwise offer the 
traveller their assistance. On the whole, these coun- 
try folk, though rather slow and reticent, and on 
account of time-worn customs clinging more tena- 
ciously to them, not so ready to embrace Christian- 
ity, when they once do so they make the more 
staunch siiipporters of the same. 



XIX 
THE GREY HOUSE A]N^D ITS MAKEE 

THE exterior of the Japanese house always 
has an unfinished appearance. IsTever for 
hygiene or beauty is a coat of paint allowed 
to blend its soft colours with the manifold tints of 
nature around it. Though clean-looking when new, 
being unpainted, the ravages of time soon leave it 
a grey and dingy " barn." At times, however, to 
preserve the weatherboarding from rapid decay, the 
exterior side of the lumber is burned before using 
to an ugly, scorching black. There is something 
extremely fascinating about the maker of these 
domiciles. Like many other " things Japanese," 
the carpenter's methods also are much the opposite 
of those in the West. ISTot to speak disparagingly 
of our good American mechanics, the Japanese are 
certainly handy with tools. With catlike agility, 
and yet with seemingly little effort, they will work 
at tiny frail articles where a Westerner would be 
apt to find his nerves unstrung. We once looked 
into a large cooper shop and saw a lot of men sit- 

191 



192 THE GREY HOUSE AND ITS MAKER 

ting on the floor, working with both hands and feet 
like so many machines in a factory. While with 
chisel and hammer in hand they drove the hoops, 
their feet were constantly in the air, keeping the 
large half-barrel casks whirling like they were on 
pivots. 

In Japan most articles are still wrought by hand, 
and though the carpenter or cabinet-maker should 
be engaged either in the construction of a large 
building or in making heavy furniture, yet is it 
altogether in contrast to the buzzing machinery of 
a modern factory, and the noisy whistles that wail 
like a " banshee '' or howl like a dog. Indeed, when 
the carpenter begins to erect a building, there is 
considerable noise connected with preparing the 
foundation, but such noises are of a very pleasing 
nature. One day we heard a clamour of high- 
keyed voices near our house, like that of some men 
singing jubilantly at a picnic; they kept it up in 
the forenoon and in the afternoon^ till, full of curi- 
osity, we went to see what it meant, and found a 
gang of fat-faced coolies with a heavy block pound- 
ing the ground where large stones were to be placed 
for a foundation. One of these workmen would 
lead out in a singsong of a short stanza; when 
through, the others started their ditty, each one still 



DISPELLING THE DEMONS 193 

holding on to his rope, ready to lift the block, but 
the lifting came only after the song ceased. 

At this stage the Shinto priest, wearing a black 
lacquered hat, comes on the scene. He squats on 
a straw mat in the centre of the space where the 
structure is to be erected. With a big duster-like 
implement composed of strands of pendent rice 
paper fastened to a stick, he dispels the demons 
and hobgoblins with which the place might have 
hitherto been infested. 'Now he runs a few bars 
on his flute, claps his hands and worships; then 
from a small, crude tray he sprinkles rice toward 
the four points of the compass, kneels again, and 
with his flat, shingle-shaped sceptre bestows his 
august benediction upon the site, bows veiy low 
and as quick as thought unceremoniously disap- 
pears from the expressionless crowd of workmen. 

For the walls of a house very few girders are 
used and hardly any braces ; hence it happens some- 
times that the more common cottages soon begin 
to lean. Where the roof is of heavy tile, the tim- 
bers underneath, which support the rafters, are also 
very strong and, in fact, are the heaviest of the 
entire house. These crossbeams and sills are not 
sawed straight, but left as ornamental as nature 
made them. After these workmen have arranged 



194? THE GREY HOUSE AND ITS MAKER 

the support for the uprights and placed them in 
position, it is that heavy, grey-tiled roof which de- 
mands their immediate attention. 

Grey tiles ! Here and everywhere from the kilns, 
that seem as numerous as the sacrificial altars of 
the gods, black smoke is towering the hazy skies. 
Chancing to pass such a typical " home of tiles," 
we proceed to the doorless entrance, and there 
under a low-eaved, straw-covered roof, find in a large 
space a few little men — some working a yellowish 
mud, some with wire cut uniform layers from a sym- 
metrically squared ledge of soft clay, sever these 
into tile lengths and place them on curved moulds 
to be fashioned and dried. The master, with a 
few other men, squat on the dirt floor, trimming 
the product and adding the finishing touches ; way 
at one end of the structure, the residence of the 
proprietor, in a little round straw basket is a 
darling, purple-faced, newly-born babe squealing 
lustily for its ruddy-cheeked mother, who with the 
grand-dame has been out stacking tiles into the 
kiln, and now comes in to soothe her firstborn. 
Well burned, the tile is tough and durable, has a 
shiny surface and is slate-coloured through and 
through; one dollar's worth will roof about six 
square feet. 



JAPANESE ARCHITECTURE 195 

The rafters for the roof are laid upon the heavy 
beams that are built into trusses one upon another 
in diminishing squares. On top of these rafters 
is placed a sheet of thin boards or a network of 
split bamboo, upon which, into a thick layer of 
pliable clay, the tile are closely fitted. When such 
a thoroughly strong and serviceable roof, that can 
not only resist the ravages of the sky but ought to 
well endure typhoons, is finished, the builder pro- 
ceeds to complete the structure at his leisure. It 
may be months, perhaps years, before the walls 
and general interior appurtenances receive the nec- 
essary attention. In the meantime, however, the 
tenants have entered upon occupation. 

The houses which are covered with straw have 
strong bamboo poles for rafters ; no nails are used, 
everything being tied with ropes; this is also the 
case in putting up scaffolding, etc. The frame- 
work of the low^er walls is spiked with wooden pins. 
In the cities and larger towns, however, nails and 
locks, which are little known in the interior, have 
come into common use. For lighter articles, such 
as weatherboarding, as well as for the little wood- 
work inside, cedar is generally employed. "When 
not convenient to obtain ready-sawed lumber from 
the dealer, the carpenter can play sawyer, and with 



/ 



196 THE GREY HOUSE AND ITS MAKER 

a saw two feet in length and often over one foot 
wide, he can easily rip an old water-soaked cedar 
log into boards and strips. Where Western men 
working in lumber think it necessary to season it 
as soon as possible, in Japan splendid cedar logs 
are kept anchored in large rafts along the rivers 
or in ponds for years. Thus the wood retains its 
natural colour and beauty — this none will doubt 
when examining the lovely interior woodwork of 
the high-class dwellings, planed to a fault, but 
never painted and rarely oiled. 

The Japanese carpenter needs no workbench, and 
well for him, since space is such a valuable com- 
modity. He can do a great deal of work sitting 
on the ground. It is very amusing and instructive 
to watch him planing a board, pulling the plane to- 
ward him, and instead of a vice, the board simply 
set against a peg is easily steadied with his toes. 
That the Japanese have to hold their wooden clogs 
on with their two largest toes, probably accounts 
for these members being almost as useful as some 
Westerners' thumb and forefinger. Imagine a car- 
penter sawing boards over his lap, and putting up 
cabinet drawers holding the boards between his 
toes. 

Whatever this carpenter cannot do, he can at 




INTERIOR OF JAPANESE HOUSE 




THE AGILE LITTLE CARPENTER 



FREQUENT « SIESTAS *' 197 

least evince much patience and a marvellous de- 
gree of skill in planing the most cross-grained and 
knotty board to a polish. Some of his tools are of 
a Western type, others are ingeniously native. One 
of the much-used tools is the adz, with which, when 
two or three men are edging a log, their strokes are 
alternate and as regular in measure as when they 
(hammer nails, or when the farmers thrash with 
flail, or a few coolies pound rice mochi, or a gang 
of four or five section hands work their picks just 
as uniformly as a squad of soldiers shoulder their 
guns, take aim, fire, etc. But all such mechanical 
exertions quite often come to a sudden end, and tiny 
pipes are leisurely pufied, tea drunk and stories 
told in genuine Oriental fashion. 



XX 

THE JAPAI^ESE "YADOYA" 

WHILE tea-houses and inns, like ordinary 
residences, are usually one-storied, ho- 
tels are commonly two-story structures 
with flags and gay lanterns hanging in front. 
Upon arrival, the baggage is speedily taken in by 
a number of willing pairs of hands. " Honourably 
condescend to come in," shouts the landlord and 
all the maids, who have already, by their extremely 
low bows, made a wedge into the visitor's favour. 
Glancing above him, he may see two rows of 
red lanterns strung before the hami-dana — ^god 
shelf — where amid lights and sacrificial dishes 
stand a number of fox gods. Various other ven- 
erated idol images of good luck, etc., are fastened 
to the wall in conspicuous places. No soiled foot- 
wear may touch those clean white mats, and hence 
are at once exchanged for a pair of indoor slippers, 
which are worn on the polished corridor leading 
past many rooms and up a steep stairway, until 

198 



MOVABLE WALLS 199 

the guest reaches his apartment, where even these 
are removed. 

There is no continuation of walls ahout the 
house nor in the division of rooms, of which there 
are many on both floors. But whatever little wall- 
ing there may be is all built of a network of bamboo 
lath on which brown mud mixed with chopped 
straw is plastered. To give this all the attractive- 
ness possible, a coat of whitewash or some other 
colouring is applied. Instead of outer walls facing 
the garden or street, there are the amado — 
rain doors, which in the daytime are shoved in 
their grooves to a corner of the building. There 
still remain the three-foot-wide sJioji, covered with 
translucent rice paper, so that the rooms are com- 
fortably illumined with softened sunlight. The 
partitions are composed of similar-sized opaque 
paper panels called fusuma, whose crinkled 
green or sky-blue surface is splashed with gold. 
Sometimes they are decorated with drawings in 
India ink of Japan's rural scenes or characters of 
by-gone days. These panels, without the least 
trouble, can be lifted out of their grooves and the 
whole floor transformed into one room. 

The floors of each little chamber are covered 
with uniform-sized thick mats made of rushes per- 



^00 THE JAPANESE " YADOYA " 

fectlj fitted together and leaving no interstices. 
These houses, as well as their stolid-looking little 
denizens, are simple in appearance and, in a way, 
delightful bits of ornamentation. The hotel furni- 
ture is conspicuous by its absence; no table nor 
chair, perhaps not even a hat rack. We squat on a 
cushion in front of the indispensable brazier where 
water in a little, antique-fashioned iron teakettle 
is everlastingly boiled. As the coals die down, the 
hotel maid with deft fingers shifts the embers with 
brass tongs shaped like chopsticks. Immediately, 
insipid, lemon-coloured tea and little cakes are 
served on a lacquer tray. 

In the city the kitchen is quite a large, open 
place, through which everybody, from the master 
down to the cheapest coolie, may stroll. In the 
little country hotel, however, this part is more or 
less a haunted-looking abode, with wall and rafters 
blackened with soot and smoke. Sitting in our 
room, we clap our hands (instead of the call bell), 
whereufpon a chorus of voices from the kitchen and 
everywhere screeches '*^ Hai-i/' and by and by there 
comes the heavy step of chubby feet pattering along 
the polished hall floor. Getting an order for supper, 
with a forced smile and low bow and much sucking 
in of the breath — a sign of great respect and po- 



SCALDING BATHS 201 

liteness — ^the little maid, who acts as cook, errand 
boy, bath keeper, house cleaner, etc., informs us 
that the bath is ready, as it is the custom of all 
guests to avail themselves of that luxury at the first 
opportunity. 

Japanese baths are a speciality, and the only 
unpleasant feature about them is that the water is 
so seldom changed. One big tub full has to serve 
for many bathers; but there is one redeeming fea- 
ture — all take a preliminary soap and water scrub 
outside the tub. Then they get into the bath and 
soak for at least fifteen minutes in water of about 
110 degrees. Of course there are many hundreds 
of public bathhouses in every city; also the more 
well-to-do have their private bathrooms. But in 
the rural districts, where these are not available, 
be it night or day, the family promiscuously and 
ostentatiously take their tub into the yard or even 
close to the public road, provided no policeman 
prowls about. 

On one such occasion, being among the first 
guests, we descended the broad stairway and 
availed ourselves of the steaming bath. The water, 
not yet having reached more than a hundred de- 
grees, felt very enjoyable. Soon another guest, a 
young soldier, was with us in the huge tank — ^to 



THE JAPANESE " YADOYA " 

this we dared not object in the Orient — but to our 
horror we discovered that this bathing tank was 
used promiscuously by both sexes, so made a hasty 
exit. That such a habit is customary everywhere 
in Japan would not be a correct statement, but to 
enter any ordinary reputable lodging, one is never 
positively sure that he will not meet with similar 
experiences. But these people seem far less con- 
cerned about this " malady of Orientalism "—dis- 
regard for privacy and what is in their minds over- 
drawn Western modesty — than they are about their 
notion of cleanliness. 

Passing a number of rooms, through slightly 
opened shoji we observed some of the guests en- 
gaged in playing Japanese chess, others in story- 
telling; the geisha twanged on the samisen, and 
others, from shallow cups, were drinking hot sake, 
which from appearances had already turned their 
heads. Supper was served in our room on a lac- 
quered tray placed on the matting; the dishes, 
mostly beautifully lacquered wooden bowls with 
covers of a like artistic pattern, were deftly ar- 
ranged after rigid table etiquette. In the left comer 
of the tray was a small bowl of rice; on the right 
a wooden bowl of miso soup, containing strips of 
radish, edible seaweed, for which the coast waters 



ORIENTAL MENU 203 

are raked and strained, also bean curd and egg- 
plant. 

But there seems to be no end of soups — fish and 
clam soups, the latter usually served with the shells ; 
they are all flavoured with soy sauce, which also 
enters into almost all other dishes. A small plate 
of pickled vegetables occupied the farther left corner 
of the tray; in the remaining corner a nice piece 
of broiled fish, with a dab of grated radish and mus- 
tard and a boiled yellow chrysanthemum. Some- 
times the fish is roasted, and when the fat melts 
and drops into the fire, volumes of oily smoke emit 
a fearful smell throughout the entire neighbour- 
hood. 

Again, raw fish served in thin slices, is a dish to 
which the Japanese are very partial. I^ot so with 
the Westerner, but one might eat an egg fried 
which would by no means pass muster raw; even 
so with fish. Then again we eat oysters raw — why 
not other kinds of fish? But we must not fail to 
mention another side dish on the tray — a pickled eel 
with a tiny cup of sweetened beans, a mushroom 
and other fungi. The eel was split from gill to 
tail and the head and backbone removed. Crabs, 
shrimps, lobsters, cuttlefish or octopus, coated with 
flour and fried in rape oil or boiled in soy, are 



S04 THE JAPANESE " YADOYA " 

favourite dishes. Besides sweet potatoes and a 
variety of vegetables, bamboo shoots, bulbs of tiger 
lilies, indigestible rhizome of the lotus, as well as 
other unheard-of delicacies, have a place in the 
larder. But one's gastronomic cravings are com- 
pletely outraged when the landlord, in extremity, 
rushes a tough rooster of too long experience into 
the menu. 

Poor peasants, however, can partake of pickles, 
salted fish, and any kind of " broth of abominable 
things," or patronize the travelling restaurant 
which we passed en route to this yadoya. Many 
poor mortals, finding it hard to buy a morsel of 
rice, resort to this cheap macaroni restaurant. 
" Did this vendor get his supplies from the manu- 
facturer whom I saw kneading his dough on a straw 
mat with his feet ? " we wondered. Dipping ball 
after ball of these slippery strings into boiling 
water and again in succession into separate bowls, 
he added a sprinkling of cheap soi/ and green onion 
cuttings, and sticking into them the crudest kind 
of chopsticks, presented them to his miscellaneous 
customers. Sturdy coolies leaving their cart shafts, 
haggard women releasing loads of boxes and 
bundles from their backs, also a lot of chil- 



TABLE ETIQUETTE 205 

dren with great rapidity bolted down this seething 
mess. 

But in one point they were not unlike our festive 
neighbours in the adjoining room at the yadoya. 
Their noisy gulpings and much gurgling and suck- 
ing in of the breath while eating, though ever so 
distressing to us, we rather excused when remem- 
bering that in their minds it only shows a polite 
appreciation of the food. The hotel maid who 
ladles out the rice from a cylindrical wooden tub 
may chance to be a most amiable conversationalist, 
but woe betide the foreigner who, awkwardly han- 
dling his chopsticks, must satisfy his hunger while 
the waitress, as though asphyxiated, sits confront- 
ing him with one prolonged gaze. But, mustering 
courage, one finds great delight in the art and 
beauty of Japanese simplicity, of which the wood- 
work of these little drawing-rooms furnish an ex- 
ample. The long carved transoms above the par- 
titions of my room contain lovely patterns of fabu- 
lous beasts and flowers. The posts and lintels of 
the alcove — a knotty sapling or gnarly, slim tree 
trunk, simply peeled of its bark and varnished, or 
again planed to a polish and unvarnished, as is 
nearly always the case — reveal the deft hand of the 
woodworker. 



206 THE JAPANESE " YADOYA " 

In this alcove, called tohonoma, hang two 
well-mated hahemoiio — wall pictures — a painting 
on white silk of lanky storks on the seashore with 
the rising sun above ; again a blossoming branch of 
cherry or racemes of purple wistaria, dexterously 
executed, may be found in the better hotels. The 
low ceilings are of thin cedar boards, between which 
and the upper floor, ugly, daring rats scamper and 
squeal while we partake of our meal. These ma- 
rauders may as likely as not make their bed on 
your very pillow. Amusement and consternation 
may at times seize a worshipping congregation 
when over the preacher's head a troop of rats thun- 
der across the ceiling. 

At night, parlour and dining-room are trans- 
formed into sleeping apartments. Ordinary travellers 
are given a room to themselves, but in the cheaper 
hotels the Japanese, in order to secure lower rates, 
often sleep as many men or women in a compart- 
ment as can find room on the mats. Handy is that 
little closet from which the maid jerks those thick- 
padded quilts, but this is one of the most unhy- 
gienic practices in the Sunrise Kingdom, for no 
sooner has the sleeper risen in the morning than 
these futon, which are both bed and covering, are 
again packed into the dingy closet, and thus seldom 



HOTEL DISCOMFORTS 207 

enjoy an airing. With but few exceptions, these 
mouldy quilts contain a plague of unpleasant 
odours, which to the uninitiated are simply suf- 
focating. The maid spreads them on the floor, 
places a cylinder-shaped pillow, stuffed with saw- 
dust or beans at our disposal, and bows, saying, 
" Honourably condescend to rest," and leaves the 
room. 

Between the quilts there is a pair of altogether 
too narrow sheets; but this deficiency we supply 
from our parcels, also a rubber pillow. The other 
necessary article of bedding is that green mosquito 
netting suspended from the corners of the room. 
The covers feel more like planks than blankets, yet 
" for a' that " sleep would be deemed a luxury 
were it not for those ravenous fleas which until 
dawn contend with us over the ownership of a little 
life-blood. 

If by good fortune one's room is at the end of the 
building, where he may slightly open the rain doors, 
well ; if not^ he must submit to the inevitable. The 
meagre comforts of these hotels are marred, if not 
entirely offset, by the abominable odours of the 
seldom disinfected latrines which are a part of the 
house and near the guests' rooms. What a disgrace 
to the much-vaunted cleanliness of the Japanese, 



208 THE JAPANESE « YADOYA " 

Vitiated air from the transoms of the neighbours, 
whose ill-smelling lamps are operating full time, 
manufacturing carbonic acid gas, produce visions of 
ghosts and gruesome bacteria. To all this add a 
volume of screeching and jerking discords from 
the samisen of the geisha, entertaining a party of 
hand-clapping revellers in the adjoining rooms, and 
wonder not that we reel and toss and long for the 
morning. 

But though this hotel lacks the convenience of 
the public parlour of the West, when host, clerks 
and maids treat the guest for the time being, and 
so far as exterior appearances are concerned, as 
one of the members of the family, even though 
this be done but for the fee, this in some degree 
compensates for other defects. The male servants 
greet you with a smile; the hostess always bows; 
the maid brings your meals, cleans the room, pre- 
pares and clears the bed, runs necessary errands 
for you, serves tea to your callers, etc. Compared 
with such usage, how cold is the hotel counter and 
how perfunctory the porters in the West, the 
Japanese thinks. One registers his name as before 
a judge, and is then given a key and " led to a 
sleeping cell by a boy in uniform." 

The reader must understand that this is a de- 



WELCOME TO STRANGERS 209 

scription of the average Japanese hotel off from the 
beaten track, and represents the overwhelming ma- 
jority of those which yet cling to the ancient ways 
of Nippon, rather than the few that attempt to 
imitate the West. 



XXI 
OVEE THE TEACUP 

IT was after a terrific rainstorm in May, when 
the winds had scattered the last vestige of 
purple wistaria blossoms, now lying washed 
up in drifts near the little tea-houses. The after- 
noon sun broiled down on our heads, and Mr. 
Kimura addressed us apologetically, as though he 
was responsible for the enervating climate of his 
island home : " Honourably hot it has deigned to 
be." " Must be such poison to your august spirit," 
Mrs. Kimura added. 

Mr. Kimura was a very congenial and most 
obliging companion; he was dressed in Japanese 
garb, except for the little felt hat perched slightly 
to one side of his head; gold-washed spectacles 
bridged his nose, and while unconsciously playing 
his tiny soft fingers on a fancy bamboo cane as he 
complacently listened to my conversation, we noticed 
that all this time he kept the little finger motion- 
less. And little wonder, you would have thought, 

210 



TEDIOUS SALUTATIONS £11 

had you seen that ugly curved nail grown two 
inches long. To him it was an ornament — ^though 
an ancient custom; to us, however, it conveyed the 
fact that he belonged to the sort of gentry yet ex- 
tant, whose unwritten rules forbid manual labour 
as degrading. Travelling pedestrians, here and 
there a hollow-chested old sire, perhaps accompanied 
by the wife of his youth — now a stooped, panting 
oha-san, with a sprinkling of younger life on a short 
holiday, were sitting on their heels in these cliaya, 
sipping tea. Our Japanese friends could not resist 
the temptation, and we of course yielded. A little 
rest beneath covers of reed and trellised ivy at the 
busy city's edge must not be despised. 

Mr. Kimura spied a lady friend of his mother 
perched alone on a low wide bench covered with a 
red blanket. Dashing in that direction, with a 
full-orbed smile they accosted this elderly lady, 
and ere we could count two, were engrossed in the 
extremely tedious rites of salutation which per- 
haps only the Japanese can be guilty of. The lady 
on the seat bent forward with her nose on the 
blanket, while the two standing like jack-knives 
doubled their forms — that is, every time both sides 
made a bow which was drawn out and solemnly 
polite. " When will they get through ? " we thought. 



2ia OVER THE TEACUP 

The greeting began witli a remark about the 
weather; then a solicitous inquiry concerning the 
health — and one side quicker than the other 
suavely rejoined, '^ Through your honourable 
shadow, I am very well ; " the next bow was bur- 
dened by mutual apologies for neglecting to call 
for such a weary long time, though afterward I 
learned that they had met just the week before. 
!N^ext both sides not only raked up the gifts and 
favours received at recent dates, but from the deep 
recesses of their minds conjured up some service 
either parents or grandparents had obtained even 
years ago. Such matters were duly acknowledged 
with great gratitude expressed in the politest pos- 
sible terms, and then also responded to with a 
lengthy and polished equivalent of " Don't mention 
it." In a faultless manner these movements were 
repeated until our ears became deaf to their greet- 
ings and we seemed to look on toy figures mechanic- 
ally in motion. We could only think of aching 
backs and giddy heads! 

'At last the two were coaxed to discard their clogs 
and squat on the bench, while the foreigner pre- 
ferred gluing himself to the edge. Though early 
in the season, fans had already come into use; the 
tiny one handed to Mrs. Kimura she declined in 



THE BLIND IVIASSAGEUR 213 

words that seemed like dumping a heart full and 
overflowing with thanks into the lap of her lady 
friend, saying in Japanese superlatives that it was 
perfectly delightful and refreshingly cool. We 
were inclined to agree with her when looking 
through the streamer of red lanterns hanging under 
the eaves, out upon the wooded hills bathed in the 
richest indigo colouring. 

The group of slatternly women gossipping near 
the smoky side door of the adjoining cJiaya ap- 
peared very conspicuous in their contrast to the 
young lassie who brought us our tea. She was 
sparing of words and gentle as the zephyr in her 
manners. A few trickling drops of tea sipped from 
tiny cups and a little assortment of cakes covered 
with white, green, yellow or pink sugar — ^looking 
prettier than they tasted — helped to break the 
monotony, while the two ladies in mincing fashion 
carried on a brisk conversation. 

Glancing around, we saw the elder of the two 
empty her little metal pipe by pounding it on 
the rim of the iron brazier and leisurely refill it 
from her silk-covered tobacco pouch, which was an 
effective suggestion for my companions to disfigure 
their mouths with cigarettes. Just then a blind 
massageur, one of the many of this profession, 



214 OVER THE TEACUP 

blowing a bamboo whistle, and with the aid of a 
cane, with an unsteady tread, partly due to his high- 
cleated geta, passed the tea-house. 

From the open slioji of a stuffy rear room came 
a gruff male voice commanding the docile young 
waitress to call in that amma-san. Looking a little 
more closely, we observed a promiscuous crowd in 
all attitudes of ease and repose on the mats, munch- 
ing food and smoking, while in a farther corner 
this patient, seemingly distressed with rheumatism, 
and with not too much passiveness, waited for the 
blind man to feel his way to the rear. To get as 
vigorous a treatment as possible and also the full 
value of the three cents fee, the old man dropped 
his kimono, the only vestige of covering on his back, 
down to his hips, and the sallow-faced massageur 
with his fists began to systematically maul the shoul- 
ders and other pain-affected parts ; quite exhausted, 
he rested his hands while digging his elbows into 
his patient's ribs or rubbing them briskly over the 
body. Then a succession of lighter touches with 
the flat hands began to favourably tell on the old 
man, who sprawled over sideways on the mat, and 
the sonorous snortings that reached our ears indi- 
cated that he had gone to slumberland. That these 
professionals are patronized by all, from the Em- 



COMPLICATED TEA CEREMONY 215 

peror down to the lowest coolie, proves what a 
necessary adjunct the massageur is to Japanese 
life. 

" You've witnessed the tea ceremony ? " Mr. 
Kimura inquired as he filled our thimble from a 
typical Japanese teapot with hollow handle at right 
angles to the spout. " We have, sir." ^^ And how 
did you like it ? " he asked again. " An intricate 
production," we replied. " The guests, formally 
sitting on their heels like immovable stocks, while 
the hostess puts a small quantity of powdered tea 
into the bowl which is used for this occasion, pour- 
ing hot water into it and stirring it with a bamboo 
whisk, and then waiting on each one of the guests 
in their turn, who must drain the bowl in so many 
number of sips, no less and no more; the number 
and kinds of bows made before and after drinking ; 
in short, the every movement and sound to be in 
accordance with some great unwritten law of the 
ancients; all this, sir, we consider a vastly com- 
plicated art." " But you enjoyed it, did you not ? " 
" We did not," we confessed, " and that for more 
than one reason. One is, we are ever under a strain 
and fear of making some exasperating and mirth- 
provoking blunder, not much unlike the one com- 
mitted by one of our intimate Japanese friends 



216 OVER THE TEACUP 

unacquainted with foreign table etiquette. Return- 
ing home rather late one day, after the rest of the 
family had already dined, this friend, a prominent 
official in that country town, just arrived at the 
front door behind us, we cordially begged him to 
enter the dining-room and share in the repast. 
* ^0, thanks,' he repeated ; and stating * that the 
honourable interior is already full,' indicated that 
he had indeed partaken of his noon meal at home. 
But a little more coaxing gained the point. JSTicely 
seated, and not aware that Japanese custom insists 
on ' all that is set before you, eat,' — we passed him 
a large dish of kidney beans, entreating him to help 
himself. With a graceful bow he placed the dish 
beside his plate and with the large serving spoon 
proceeded to eat the whole. With an excruciating 
effort. I suppressed my laughter; we however could 
not prevail upon our friend to partake of any 
desserts. All he could utter was ' Ippai! ippail!' 
(full) and pat his stomach." '' Very interesting," 
Mr. Kimura remarked, but rather willing to change 
the subject, continued, " And do you know that to- 
day the tea ceremony is taught in most Girls' 
Schools ? " ^' Yes, and it must greatly tend to culti- 
vate that calm and sedate gracefulness in the young 
ladies," we made answer ; " otherwise also good 



VISITING THE TEA PICKERS 217 

enough for the palmy days of Old Nippon, but 
for the twentieth century too much of a time- 
killer.'' 

^^ Ah, we Japanese will never surrender such a 
long-cherished institution." ^^ Well, the names of an- 
cient sires celebrated for popularizing this art may 
be household words; those uniform-sized, nine-foot- 
square tea rooms found among many rich through- 
out your country may have some very historical 
connections — ^the oldest of these rooms we had the 
privilege of seeing in an antiquated temple — ^but 
please give us something more potent, more up 
to date." 

Nodding his head sideways like a sparrow, so 
characteristic of the Japanese when puzzled, he 
slowly droned, '' So desu ne/' a noncommital expres- 
sion which may either denote assent or dissent; 
then more animatedly he continued, " At this time 
the tea pickers are busy on the large plantations 
only about fifteen miles by train from here; how 
about going there in the morning ? " " All right, 
Mr. Kimura, w^e shall accompany you with pleas- 
ure," we replied. 

We found this the most favourable time to obtain 
an instructive peep at tea-growing. In the Tama- 
shiro district, and especially the country about Uji, 



218 OVER THE TEACUP 

the plantations are considered the best in the Em- 
pire. Where a comparatively large portion of the 
tillable land is utilized for rice crops, here the tea 
gardens are the one great source of wealth to this 
section. This industry may be said to extend from 
39 deg. N. lat. southward over all the Japanese 
islands. But while in many places tea is more or 
less cultivated for little else than local consumption, 
there seem to be but a few regions where it can be 
grown to much profit. 

Kunning into the district of Uji, the valleys and 
way up the gently sloping hills looked from a dis- 
tance like a veritable sand waste. But a closer 
view suddenly revealed this to be mats and layers of 
straw with which the tea gardens during April and 
May are covered in order to preserve the leaves 
bleached and tender. 

" Is tea indigenous to Japan ? " we asked Mr. 
Kimura. " IN'o," he said. " Like as the science of 
making Satsuma ware and the erection of artistic 
temples were introduced from Korea, I must also 
acknowledge that the tea plant was brought from 
China in the ninth century by a Buddhist monk.'' 

"Black tea from India and China is largely ex- 
ported to Europe, is it not ? " " Yes, and the Japa- 
nese product, almost exclusively a green variety, has 



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A REFRESHING BEVERAGE 219 

its principal market in America," he proudly an- 
swered. Few seem to realize that tea is the daily 
beverage and an important food auxiliary of at 
least half the world's population. The Japanese 
in particular are tea epicures, and in 1906 that 
country alone exported four hundred million dol- 
lars' worth. 

A hospitable plantation owner, although so busy 
that attire seemed to have become well-nigh useless, 
still found time to serve us a refreshing beverage 
from leaves picked and dried on the spot a few days 
before — a privilege very few " tea topers " enjoy. 
" From all Fve seen, it appears that tea manu- 
facture in this country, instead of being conj&ned 
to big establishments, is mostly handled by little 
households," we observed. " Quite true," our 
friendly host replied. 

Where in other climes the leaves are picked three 
or four times annually, in Japan this usually takes 
place but once. These little ball-shaped shrubby 
trees, three or four feet tall, when in uniform rows 
covering the bald, bleak hills, would be of great 
value even though it were only for their singular 
decorative effects; when the shrubs are in bloom, 
myriads of fragrant, wax-like flowers of a creamy 
white, twinkling like snowflakes on an emerald 



220 OVER THE TEACUP 

background, exceedingly enhance their beauty. A 
monstrous jet-black bull standing diametrically in 
our road forced us to halt, and while conversing 
with his indulgent master, I asked how early the 
first crop may be gathered from these plants. " Oh, 
they yield from three years old to three hundred," 
he casually replied. 

The black man in the cotton fields, or the fruit- 
gatherers of sunny Italy, can hardly produce as pic- 
turesque a scene as these tea pickers, whose chatter 
is as joyful as that of the vintage workers down the 
valleys of the Ehine and the Ehone. Thousands of 
young lassies and wrinkled-faced Oha-sans, each 
with a big bamboo basket, can be seen under these 
straw roofs or else on the outskirts of a garden, 
plucking the tender shoots with the leaf-buds and 
expanding leaves which alone are gathered for tea 
manufacture. 

These women, whose kimono and coiffure are al- 
ready so unique, whether found stooping on the 
plantation or homeward bound with a harvest on 
their shoulders, as they come in flocks like sheep 
down the narrow roads, with a strip of snow-white 
towelling invariably gathered in deft folds on their 
shining black hair, beneath which, from a grinning 
face, a pair of artful eyes and often ebony-dyed 



CURING THE LEAVES ^21 

teeth appear, present a most vivid and never-to-be- 
forgotten picture. 

Where in the preparation of black tea the leaves 
are exposed to the sun and air and treated like hay 
in order that an incipient saccharine fermentation 
may be produced, green tea is subjected to a more 
rapid process. 'No sooner have the pickers dumped 
their harvest into gigantic bamboo trays than it is 
dipped, batch for batch, by means of a sieve, into 
a cauldron of steaming water, exposed for a moment 
to a brisk heat, then spread on a big table and with 
mechanical fans rapidly cooled. In this mashy 
condition it is thinly scattered on frames covered 
with sheets of leathery paper, placed over a char- 
coal fire and for two or three minutes gently but 
swiftly worked until completely dried. 

The colour of the genuine green tea is entirely 
due to the rapid drying of the fresh leaves, which 
prevents the chlorophile from undergoing any 
alteration. Immediately it is hustled to a number 
of tables, where most scantily dressed men give it 
an energetic rolling between their hands. Batches 
of women, squatted on their heels around low ta- 
bles here and there, do the assorting and preparing 
for the market. 

"You seem singularly contented," we remarked 



^22 OVER THE TEACUP 

to a group of tea gatherers, as they loitered in the 
shade of luxurious bamboos by the roadside. '^ Yes, 
but the season continues for only twenty days," they 
answered with an air of regret. ^^ But what are 
your wages V^ To this a chubby, masculine- 
featured woman, speaking for all, pointed to some, 
and then again to others, saying, " These get fifteen 
cents and those up to thirty cents per day." 

" And what about last year's tea ? " we asked an 
elderly, iron- jointed master with his kimono front 
wide open down the neck and a huge mushroom- 
shaped hat shading his brow, and whose every pulse- 
beat yet vibrated with the spirit of the once ex- 
clusive Japan. " Seldom much left over," he 
gruffly answered. " The I-jin-San (Mr. Barbarian) 
would not buy old tea." 

" Then, Mr. Kimura," we said as he accom- 
panied us to the railway station, " perhaps not a 
little of this old tea is consumed in this country." 
" ISTot only that," he replied, " the poor people must 
often content themselves with an infusion of coarse 
leaves and sorted-out stems." But when the car 
wheels began to revolve, my obliging friend made 
one more charming bow, and shouted, " A cup of 
Shapanese tea, Banzai! ! '' 



INDEX 



Abbot, Buddhist, 105. 
Accordeon, 60. 
Acolyte, 21. 
Acrobat, on train, 128. 
Air-castles, marvellous, 161. 
Alps, miniature, 140. 
Amado, rain-doors, 199, 207. 
Amma-san, " Mr. Massageur," 

214; patronized by all, 215. 
Apartments, sleeping, 206. 
Appellation, posthumous, given 

to dead, 167. 
Architraves, of temple, 22. 
Artist, native, 151. 
Aspirants after distinction, 

161. 
Authority all in all, 45. 
Avengers, 115. 
Awaji Island, 138. 

B 

Baldachin, in temple, 22. 
Ballads, 74. 

"Bamboo children!" 56, 93. 
Band, modern brass, 59; 

stand, 60. 
Banzai, Hurrah! 222. 
Barber, 26; outfit, 27. 
Bathing, sea, 60; primitive 

customs, 61. 
Bath, Japanese, a specialty, 

hot, public, 201. 
Bell, temple, 24, 25. 
Bento, lunch, 126. 
Betrothal, customs, presents, 

39. 
Bevy, of schoolgirls^ 125. 
Bier, 168. 

Blotches, unsightly, 27, 88. 
Blunder, an amusing, 216. 



Bon festival, Japanese All 

Saints' Day, 177. 
Bon-san, Buddhist priest, 33. 
Booths, 24, 54; sweet potato, 

57. 
Bouquet-making, 97, 98. 
Bouts, drinking, 166. 
Brazier, 200. 
Bridal finery, 40. 
Bride, 40. 
Bridges, rustic, 23. 
Buddhism, 102, 105, 110; 

burial customs of, 170, 171. 
Burglars, 48. 



Calls, New Year, 48, 49. 
Camellia, 19, 93. 
Captives, Russian, 143. 
Carpenter, methods, 191 ; 

tools, 197. 
Carriage, 115. 
Cars, little, 124, 126; electric, 

of American construction, 

132. 
Carvings, 22. 

Castle, man's house not, 46. 
Cemetery, 62, 178. 
Ceremony, farewell, 177; tea, 

215. 
Champions, swordsmanship, 

115. 
Chapel, 24. 
Character, resembling Indian, 

116. 
Chef, 45. 
Cherry, 19, 92. 
Chief, of police, 122. 
Children, 19; fishermen's, 87. 
Chozu-hachi, laver, 104. 



nii 



INDEX 



Chrysanthemum, 92. 

Civilization, Western, in 
Japan, 128. 

Clamour, when erecting build- 
ings, 192. 

Clam-soup, as symbol, 41. 

Clash, fierce, 119. 

Class, warrior, 115. 

Clatter, terrific, 137. 

Climate, enervating, 210. 

Cloisonn6 ware, 98. 

Coffins, 169. 

Coiffures, 32, 38, 42. 

Colleague, 109. 

Combat, with fleas, 135. 

Commerce, thriving, 141. 

Companion, Mr. Kimura, con- 
genial, 210. 

Compelled, to wed, 39. 

Conflict, of sea and land, 138. 

Conglomeration, old and new 
Japan, 23. 

Connoisseurs, 102. 

Conscripts, umvilling, 112. 

Consent, parental, necessary 
to marriage, 35. 

Contests, school, 163, 165. 

Coolies, 39, 127. 

Cormorants, fishing, 86. 

Corpse, how dressed, 170. 

Cortege, funeral, 167. 

Costume, native, 50. 

Courtesy, of students, 78. 

Country, 86 per cent unfit for 
cultivation, 183. 

Courage, 120. 

Cremation, 171. 

Criminals, garb of, 130. 

Curios, 102. 

Customs, outlandish, 42, 43; 
New Year, 44, 45; burial, 
170. 

D 

Debts, stealing in order to 
pay, 48. 

Decorations, New Year, 45-51. 

Decorum, of Christian funer- 
als, 172. 

Depot, central, in Tokyo, 130. 



Description, not a complete, 

of schools, 165. 
Devotee, 19, 24. 
Dirge, funeral, 25. 
Discords, 208. 
Disorder, in train, 134. 
Districts, rural. Western cus- 
toms penetrating, 188. 
Ditties, 72. 
Divers, 85. 
Divorces, 36. 
Dolphins, 86. 
Dragons, 22. 

Draught, great, of fishes, 79. 
Drills, swimming, 61; mili- 
tary, 112; fencing, 119. 
Drought, 109. 
Dwarf trees, 96. 
Dwellings, fishermen's, 87. 

E 
Ear Mound, 116. 
Ebisu, god of good luck, 101. 
Eczema, common, 27. 
Eden, of islets, 141. 
Education, in former days, 

153. 
Ee-jin, foreigner, 189. 
Effort, vocal, 72, 157. 
Energy, of priests, 21. 
Etiquette, table, 202. 
Exertions, of students, 160. 
Exhibition, stereopticon, 62; 

athletic, 163. 



Fare, of peasants, 183. 

Farewell, 84; to spirits, 176. 

Farmer, garb, 188; abode, 
191; children, polite, 190. 

Feast, funeral, 169. 

Feats, swiraming, 85. 

Feet, handy, 192. 

Fencing, 117. 

Fields, small, paddy, 183, 187. 

Finery, bridal, 40. 

Fire, brigade, 58; bell, de- 
scription of, 69. 

First-comers, 102. 

Fisher-folk, 89. 



INDEX 



^25 



Flag, national, 49. 

Flail, still used, 186. 

Fleas, ravenous, 207. 

Flora, Japanese, 90. 

Fortune-tellers, 40. 

Frenzy, of priest and people, 
22; at festival of dead, 179. 

Fruit-seller, 54. 

Fuji-yama, sacred mountain, 
70. 

Funa-uta, sailor song, 84. 

Funeral, solemn festivity, 
167; a Christian, 173. 

Furniture, conspicuous by ab- 
sence, 200. 

Fusuma, inside paper doors, 
199. 

Futon, quilts, 206. 

G 
Game, of " hide-and-seek," 

142. 
Garb, of peasants, 125. 
Garden of Orient, 90. 
Oeisha, dancing girls, 30, 36, 

208. 
Gentleman, in station, 128. 
Oeta, wooden clogs, 55, 136. 
Ghosts, 19. 

God, horse, weather, 108. 
Gong, 22, 175. 
Gorging, intellectual, 159. 
Government, all in all, 46. 
Greatness, in small things, 

151. 
Greengrocer, 54. 
Greetings, New Year, 50. 
Grudge, 116. 
Gulpings, noisy, at meals, 205. 

H 
Haii, yes, 200. 
Haixdressing, modes of, 28, 

29, 30, 33. 
Handkerchiefs, absence of, 

137. 
Harvest, 110. 
"Hat, NapoleonV 143. 
Headlands, 139. 



Hieroglyphics, on kimonos, 

127. 
Hiroshima, Bay, 143. 
High-kara, high collar, 30. 
" Holiness of Buddha," 106. 
Horse-clippers, 27. 
Horse, sacred, 147; farmers*, 

186. 
Horticulturists, 94. 
Hotels, 198. 
Houses, 58; hermetically 

sealed, 135; exterior, 191; 

walls, 193; roof, 194. 
Hydrangea, 94. 



Idols, 104, 110. 

Improvements, 128. 

Incense, 102. 

Incivility, 61. 

Income, of village, 182. 

Influence, of Christianity, 35. 

Inland Sea, famous, 138. 

Insane, not confined, 63. 

Inspectors, 61. 

Instruction, moral, in sehoola, 
162. 

Interior, 41, 124. 

Intermarriages, 37. 

Islands, innumerable in In- 
land Sea, 139. 



Japan, new, in schools, 162. 

Jinrikishas, 40, 63. 

Ju-jitsu, "soft art," 63, 120, 

121. 

K 
Kakemono, hanging picture, 

206. 
Kami-dana, god shelf, 198. 
K&iijutsu, fencing, 119. 
Kimono, 19; fishermen's, 83. 
Kites, 53. 
Komnso, old time begging 

minstrel, 53. 
Koto, musical instrument, 76. 
Kwannon, goddess of mercy, 

71. 



S26 



INDEX 



Labyrinth, of islands, 141. 

Landscaping, Japanese, 95, 
150. 

Lanterns, 24; maker, 54; 
stone, at temple, 178; 
"White Cross," 179. 

Latrines, rural, 185; at ho- 
tels, 207. 

Laughter, at funerals, 172. 

Lecture, temperance, 123. 

Leprosy, 37 ; exposed to, 66. 

Licenses, marriage, unknown, 
35. 

Lid, pot, fighting with, 118. 

Lilies, mountain, 91. 

Loquat, fruit, 93. 

Lotus, sacred, 19; ponds, 23; 
roots, eaten, 56. 

M 

Macaroni, popular, 204. 

Magazines, powder, 142. 

Magnitude, of heathen reli- 
gions, 106. 

Magnolia, 19. 

Maid, hotel, 200, 205. 

Marauders, nightly, 206. 

Market, fis^, 140. 

Marriage, contract, 36; cus- 
toms, 37; ceremony, 40, 41. 

Massageur, blind, 213, 214. 

Meadows, scarce, 187. 

Me, eyes, 19. 

Meiji, Era of Enlightenment, 
153. 

Menu, Japanese, 203, 204; 
peasants', 204. 

Mi-ai, mutual seeing, 38. 

Mirth-provoking English, 166. 

Missionary, 101. 

Miyajima, " shrine island," 
144. 

Mochi, rice dough, 47. 

Momiji-dani, maple valley, 
149. 

Monster, 102. 

Monument, quaint, 148. 



Mourners, garb of, 169. 
Musashi, famous fighter, 117. 
Musicale, a pleasing, 76. 
Music, Japanese, 72, 73; 

Western — ^not appreciated, 

73. 

N 

Nail, long finger, 211. 

Nakadachi, match-maker, 37, 
39. 

Narrow-gauge railroad, 124. 

National anthem, 77. 

Netting, mosquito, indispensa- 
ble, 207. 

New Year, New and Old, 44; 
god, 45 ; decorations, 45, 49, 
50, 51; preparations for, 
47, 48; calls, 48, 49; cards, 
49; greetings, 50. 

Nichiren, Buddhist sect, 19. 

Nio, guardian gods, 19. 

O 

Ohi, sash, 39. 

Ocha, "honourable tea," 137. 
Odours, insufferable, 133, 207. 
Oils, hair, 31, 32. 
Oleander, 92. 

0-matsuri, grand festival, 19. 
Omens, hopeful, 159. 
Opposition, of priests, 106, 
Organs, olfactory, outraged, 
185. 



Pagoda, 22, 149. 

Palanquin, ancient style, 168. 

Paradox, 99, 133. 

Park, 60. 

Party, bridal, 40. 

Pattern, of vases, 99. 

Pedlar, vegetable, 56. 

Performance, theatrical, 56; 

musical, 72. 
Persimmon, 96, 141. 
Phantom ship, 19. 
Physiognomy, of Japanese, 

101. 



INDEX 



S27 



Picnickers, 132, 133. 

Pictures, Emperor's and Em- 
press's, worshipped, 48 ; 
wall, 206. 

Pigeon-toed, 56. 

Pilgrimages, time of, 65; 
wearisome, 67 ; 23,000 miles, 
69. 

Pilgrim, outfit, 65; appear- 
ance, lepers, 66; headgear, 
staff, 67; object, 68; multi- 
tudes of, 144. 

Pillow, cylinder-shaped, 207. 

Pipers, 168. 

Platoons of country folk, 125; 
of young ladies, 137. 

Plough, old-fashioned, 186. 

Poetry, lyric, 74. 

Pole, bells rung by, 25. 

Police, 46. 

Pomegranate, 96. 

Population, 60 per cent farm- 
ers, 181. 

Postinan, 63. 

Potatoes, sweet, 57, 141. 

Powder, face, tooth, 30. 

Prayers, 64, 124. 

Practices, unhygienic, 206. 

Preacher, Japanese, 180. 

Priests, 19, 21; pilgrim, 68, 
71; at funerals, 168; dis- 
pelling demons, 193. 

Priestesses, 111. 

Privacy, disregard for, 202. 

Processions, funeral, 167; 
farewell, 175. 

Prodigies, of toil, 183. 

Public, journeying, 131. 

Q 

Quilts, mouldy, 207. 



Radishes, immense quantities 

of, 186. 
Rain-doors, 63. 
Razor, handleless, 26; filing, 

27; Buddhist, 106. 
Red-letter day, 79. 
Red-tape, in schools, 155. 



Regime, old, 145. 

Religion, of Emperor, and an- 
cestor worship, 162. 

Rescript, Emperor's, on Edu- 
cation, 77, 153. 

Residences, temples used for, 
in summer, 107. 

Resistance, to Christianity, 
110. 

Rhododendron, 92. 

Roofs, tile, 194; straw, 195. 

Roots, lotus, burdock, used 
for food, 56. 



Sacks, Imperial mail, 135. 

Sake, rice brandy, 41 ; drink- 
ing, 52. 

Salt-making, 134. 

Salutations extremely tedi- 
ous, 211. 

Samisen, Japanese banjo, 23, 
75, 208. 

Sampans, fishing boats, 45, 
81, 82. 

Samurai, warrior class, 112, 
114. 

Sandals, 55. 

Sardines, school of, 79. 

Sayonara, good-bye, 28. 

Schools, number of, 154; sub- 
jects taught, 156; crowded, 
157; one fault of, 159. 

Seaweed, edible, 137. 

Sects, of Buddhism, 106. 

Self-confidence, exhibited, 75. 

Bensei, teacher, 157. 

Shaving, infants' heads, 33; 
eyebrows, 42. 

Shima-dai, wedding table, 41. 

Shintoism, ancestor worship, 
111, 146. 

Shoji, paper doors, 37, 199. 

Shops, 54; Japanese shoe, 55; 
bazaar-like, 149. 

Shrines, 19, 53; famous, 69, 
145, 147; of patron god, 
177; family, 179. 

Shuttlecock, 53. 



INDEX 



Singing, Christian hymns, 75. 
Skill, of pilot tried, 139; in 

drawing, 159. 
Smithy, 55. 

Soil, generally unfertile, 183. 
Solo, "Helter-skelter," 74. 
Songsters, scarcity of, 91. 
Species, of sea animals, 85; 

of Japanese flora, 90, 91. 
Spirit, military, of race, 120. 
Stampede, 41. 
Station, wireless, 142. 
Story-tellers, 53. 
Streets, novel, 54, 58. 
Sweepers, human vacuiun, 

127. 
Sword, playing great r6le, 

112; ancient customs ,re- 

garding, 113. 



Tank, bathing, 202. 

Taxation, excessive, 182. 

Tea, ceremony, 215; growing, 
217; shrubs, 219; pickers, 
220. 

Teachableness of language 
students, 166. 

Teachers, number, salary, 154. 

Tea houses, 38, 211. 

Teeth, blackened, 42. 

Temple, a massive, 19; archi- 
tecture, 22, 103. 

Terraces, 183. 

Thermometer, frozen, 90. 

Thirst for education, 166. 

Tiles, 194. 

Tobacco smoke, clouds of, 135. 

Toilet, making in station, 136. 

Tokonoma, alcove, 206. 

Tomb, Emperor's, worshipped, 
162. 

Tools, barber's, disinfecting, 
27; carpenter's, 197. 

Torii, sacred arch, 147. 

Trails, aquatic, 141. 

Trait, a Japanese, 132. 



Tray, at ocean's brink, 176. 
Treachery, to friends, 116. 
Trophy, of Russian war, 148. 
Tunes, Japanese, 73. 

U 

Umbrellas, paper, 133, 189. 
Uta, tiny odes, 73. 

V 

Vase, art'stic, 98. 

Vendors, fruit and newspaper, 

141. 
Vermin, 87. 

Veterinary, priests, 107. 
Vision, Peter's, 85. 
Visitors, ghostly, 177. 
Vocalists, 74. 

W 

Wagon, Imperial ox, 131. 

Wainwright, 83. 

Walls, of house, 199. 

Watchman, night, 63; weap- 
ons, 64. 

Water, poured on tombstones, 
178. 

Weapons, of war, 113. 

Weeds, in matrimonial field, 
35. 

Well, Oriental, 58. 

Whaling, 86. 

Wistaria, 19, 94. 

Women, 58; in rice fields, 187. 

Woodwork, 196, 205. 

Workers, Christian, 179. 

Wrestlers, 24. 

Y 

Yadoya, hotel, 189. 

Yamato, ancient name for 

Japan, 154. 
Yards, Kure naval, 142. 
Yen, Japanese coin; value, 50 

cents, 40. 

Z 
Zeal, fanatical, 21. 
Zodiac, Japanese, 49. 



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